Cinnamon Hill
Played Cinnamon Hill in 2013 during a long weekend trip with the bride. Played this and White Witch and I review the area a little more here. I like Cinnamon Hill but rank it pretty well below White Witch. You get a better variety of holes here – some ocean-front and open and others into the hills and trees (on the same property as White Witch but the elevation changes are not nearly as dramatic). I think those wild elevation changes, the overall layout and the conditioning at the Witch push it ahead of Cinnamon but this is not a bad track and certainly well worth the play.
Three features about Cinnamon Hill that stand out.
- El Mar: As described above the course plays right down to the water. After playing around the clubhouse for the first four holes, the dramatic fifth “Majestic Blue” is a 432-yard par four that gently drops down to the water with aqueduct ruins to the left and el mar dead ahead. The par three sixth is over a crook of the ocean and seven climbs back away. They’re as beautiful a trio of holes as you will get.
- Ruins and stuff: You’ll encounter ruins (the aqueduct mentioned above), some old pillars and whatnot. There’s a little cemetery that is smack dab in the middle of the course (I guess poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning and family ¯\_(ツ)_/¯), and the long-time vacation home of Johnny and June Cash (more on that in a bit).
- Caddies: The caddies are all Jamaican. All female. I guess it’s kind of a marketing gimmick but it does make the course unique. Ours was pretty quiet.
From the whites, the course measures almost 6,400 yards and a 134 slope so it’s pretty tough. I do remember some water carries and it’s a little tight on the back but shot an 88 (good for me) with a 42 on the back (great for me). As I said in the White Witch review, I like Jamaica as a quick trip from the east coast. While Hawaii has some higher ranking courses, they’re just not worth the fly time versus the courses here (and Bermuda for that matter). But let me digress.
So Johnny Cash. I’m not a Country fan even a little bit with the exception of the odd Glenn Campbell or Jayhawks tune but the huge exception is Johnny Cash. It’s why I like to just shuffle my own downloaded library on iTunes on the course instead of Spotify or Apple Music. You can never get the variety of Johnny Cash, then the Decemberists, then Filter, then Supertramp. There’s no station on any of the streaming services that jumps genres like that.
I always liked Johnny Cash so seeing his house on Cinnamon Hill was a treat. He had a great library of tunes then as he knew he was dying he did a version of Nine Inch Nail’s Hurt in 2002. Mind you I’m a bigger fan of NIN but that remake was one of the (if not the) best remake and the video was equally great. So if you want to see photos of Cinnamon Hill scroll down a few inches but without further ado, I give you the best remakes IMO – all totally outkicked the originals!
It’s close with Disturbed but Hurt is number one.
This is super close to being the best but Disturbed took a good Simon & Garfunkle song and made it great.
Here’s an oldie. Manfred Mann. So much better than Springsteen’s original. I gave you the lyric version so you don’t think they’re singing, “Racked up like a douche”
Judas Priest took a middling Joan Baez song and owned it. I gave you the Unleashed in the East version as it is my favorite.
Here’s another middling effort made great. Not a fan of Joni Mitchell but Nazareth rocks This Flight Tonight.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TRNhdzX-nnM
Honorable mentions to Van Halen You Really Got Me (Kinks), Godhead Eleanor Rigby (Beatles), Godsmack Come Together (Beatles) and Anne Wilson did a great version of Stairway to Heaven.
Golf Scrapbook 