Golf - Royal St. George

The host to the 2011 Open Championship and 13 others prior to that, Royal St. George was where I watched my very first major. This time, my dad and I drove from London, and after a nice trip through the countryside, we arrived at the private clubhouse at 7am. We were the first ones there. The grounds keepers told us we could go in and walk through to the snack bar, which was closed, so we stepped into the dinning hall where we had coffee on the patio until the course staff showed up.

Around 8am, 30 minutes before tee time the starter showed up, and when we asked where the driving range was he pointed us to hitting nets outside. He then said the 10th tee where we would be starting was across number 1 tee about 5 minute walk and to have a good time.

The round was fun as we got to play 2 ball with very few other people on the course. This course was similar to The Old Course, filled with fairway bunkers and blind shots, however this time we did not have a course guidebook so each hole was an adventure. Great drives were in the rough or sand trap and bad drives were often perfect.

Although neither my dad nor I birdied 5 of the first 10 holes like Mickelson did on Sunday of the 2011 Open Championship that I watched, the sun was out and the play was fantastic. This was another great day of golf with my dad in the UK.

When we finished we looked to purchase some hats, but were reminded of how private the club is when we went to purchase a hat and were told the hats on that wall are for members only. We were then given directions to the snack bar around the outside of the clubhouse to ensure we did not enter the clubhouse, as we did not have a coat and tie. A couple pints and a grated cheese and tomato sandwich later we were headed back to London.