The course itself is pretty straightforward and not overly challenging. The parking lot is kind of a mess and they just have a bunch of temporary trailers set up as locker rooms, restrooms, pro shop, dining room, etc.
#Newport beach country club full
The clubhouse and putting green are in the midst of a huge renovation right now, so we didn't quite get the full club experience. It would always slide by another 3-5 feet to leave you with a nervous comebacker. It was really tough to get anything to stop near the hole. On putts, they were very smooth and deceptively fast. You had to hit a really well-struck shot to get any bite, even though they felt soft underfoot. Last but not least, the greens were amazing. Still, the coverage was generally lush and green everywhere. The further you strayed from the fairways, the less consistent and more difficult the lies would become with different grasses in play. The first and intermediate cuts of rough were also excellent with the ball sitting up nicely. Fairways show how nice kikuyu can be when it's well maintained. Tee boxes and fairways just about perfect throughout the course.
We teed off at 1:25 and finished exactly four hours later despite the course being completely full. There were a ton of people out there, so we gave our names to the starter and he put us in the queue. We were told to come out around 1:00, but we found out they really don't make any tee times. It took some time to coordinate the round, but it ultimately worked out well. Actually, this was the last round of a charity auction package some friends and I bought last year. I had the opportunity to play here on Thursday.