Time to backtrack a little. This was actually our first round of the trip on Monday. Thank you Johnny for adding it to the database. I'll get some pictures up as soon as I can, as well, along with the... Continue »

Time to backtrack a little. This was actually our first round of the trip on Monday. Thank you Johnny for adding it to the database. I'll get some pictures up as soon as I can, as well, along with the scorecard. This was the first GolfMoose private club outing I have attended and they did a nice job. They are doing a bunch of these in Norcal now, so it's another way like the NCGA/SCGA to get on private clubs and nice resort courses at reasonable "member for a day" rates. This one was $99 (and we also had $25 GK certs to make it even better). It was originally scheduled for February, but was rained out and postponed until April. We started on hole 6 in a full shotgun and we finished in right about 4.5 hours. I expected it to be much slower because it was cart path only and the rough was crazy deep (more on that later). I wasn't sure what to expect from conditions given the super wet winter, but Sonoma was in great overall shape. There were definitely a lot of soft spots and mushy areas. However, the playability was generally quite good from tee to green. Fairways not cut too tight, so not much roll-out on drives. And as I mentioned, the rough was insanely thick, lush and deep. Our group (and I assume every group) lost a lot of balls. When you did find it, all you could do was hack it out and try to advance the ball. It was brutal, but kind of sadistically fun to play rough that might make even the USGA blush. Surprisingly it didn't seem to slow down play as much as expected (thank you new 3-minute search rule). The bunkers were good and the greens were also pretty good despite being aerated within the past couple weeks. They were fairly soft and rolling well at medium/fast speeds. This is a pretty old school club and course in the heart of wine country, so it definitely has a special quality when you get to play it. The clubhouse is pretty awesome and the facilities are nice. The layout is fairly traditional with no changes in elevation. A creek runs throughout the course and comes into play a lot. It's a nice classic style course in a beautiful valley setting, so I would easily recommend it if you ever have a chance to play it.