Fear and Louthing

County Louth Golf Club ("Baltray") dates back to 1892, though the current links only took their form under the ministrations of Tom Simpson (no relation) back in the late 1930's.  Simpson was an eccentric Englishman who dressed sharply and drove fast cars, and his resume is not without a smidgen of uncertainty, as it includes notables such as Balybunion and Cruden Bay, in addition to Baltray.

The uncertainty is due to the fact that in each case he reworked an existing links, and the extent to which credit should be allocated remains murky.  But Simpson also wrote extensively on design principles, as per this excerpt from Planet Golf:

Throughout his career Simpson wrote beautifully on the subject of design. His work was

Tom Simpson

guided by principles that included the desire for courses to demand ‘mental agility’ and for a hole to either ‘be more difficult than it looks or look more difficult than it is’. Further he believed that the centre of the fairway should never be the ideal place to drive your ball, his best courses reflect these views through strategic bunkering and angled greens that generally encourage an approach from one side of the fairway or the other. One of the strangest anecdotes about Simpson was that he had an obituary written about him a full five years before he passed, apparently so he could approve its contents.

In any event, one could do far worse than those three names on one's resume, and in the case of Baltray the club gives all credit to Simpson.  And indeed it is a fine example of the genre, winding through the dunes of prefect golfing grounds.  The routing is two distinct nines, but with a zig here and a zag there so that each successive hole plays with a slightly different wind direction.  There are only fifty bunkers on the course and several holes that have none, but each one is there for a specific reason.  

The bride with Lowell, who unfortunately misplaced his St. Louis Cardinals cap.

Our good friend Lowell Courtney made the trek from Portrush for this round, providing the cheering section for Madam.  For those new to my blogging, Lowell is the proprietor of Lynchpin Tours, and anyone contemplating a trip to Ireland should consider dropping a dime on Lowell.  Far more personalized than the larger touring companies, Lowell and Partner David Hudson will customize an itinerary to suit any needs and as a bonus you'll actually see what things cost.  

On a day promising rain, we found ourselves behind an outing of fairly horrible golfers, and their

scramble format had surprisingly limited effect on their pace of play.  The oncoming showers were the only issue with the pace of play, but we made it in just in the nick of time.  Because of the income storm the little wind we had was from the opposite direction of the prevailing winds, always a bit of a shame though in this case the winds wasn't much of a factor.

There's no way to sugarcoat this, but Theresa simply wasn't herself.  Her putting, in particular, was so bad on the outbound nine that at one point I asked her who she was and what exactly she had done with my bride.  Speed kills, as the saying goes, and it certainly killed her first nine as she vacillated between putting with the headcover on and powering them off the green.  As Theresa typically finds the speed better than your humble correspondent, I shan't be getting cocky.

She did settle in on the back nine, winning the last three holes to win that nine.  She finished with two strong pars, one on a 173-yard Par-3 where she put her driver dead center of the green.  Just a momentary blip to ensure that I become overconfident, the reader can be assured that she'll come roaring back.

My play was better, though strangely absent the excessive hookage of the prior day.  In fact, trouble arose when I needed to draw the ball and found that skill eluding me.  Funny game we play...

Some views from the links for you:

The view from behind the Par-3 seventh.

The view from the raised tee of the short Par-4 sixteenth.

Looking back down the sixteenth.  That ball close in became my first birdie of the trip, but only after a fortuitous bounce.

I'm writing this on Saturday morning local time, and today is a travel day.  We've been staying in Drogheda, which means Bridge of the Fjord, a town of some 40,000 souls a half-hour north of Dublin.  It was a significant trading center in Roman times, and sits on the River Boyne.  The city is somewhat gritty as befitting its industrial, but quite interesting with many beautiful old stone buildings and narrow, winding streets ill-suited to the modern automobile.  Everything is within walking distance and we did go see the primary tourist attraction, St. Peter's Church featuring the remains of Sir Oliver Plunkett, who lost his head....literally.

The town's name is pronounced Dra-ha-da, with the accent on the first syllable.  The guest services manager at Willow Ridge is a delightful Irish lass named Gillian, who has spent the last several weeks instructing me on how the name is pronounced.  All I can say is that it's a good thing she didn't go into the educational field, at least judging by the performance of this one student.

Lough Eske

We drive across the country today to County Donegal,in fact to Donegal Town.  We'll be slumming it at Lough Eske Castle, and the area offers a wonderful cluster of links that we've not previously played, including highly regarde Donegal Golf Club ("Murvagh"), the delightfully-named Narin & Portnoo and Cruit Island (pronounced Cricht), reputed to be one of the best nine-holers in Ireland/Europe/The World.  In fact, sight unseen, I designated Cruit Island a "Great Place in Golf " in this post based upon a David Owen reader's trip report.