Dorian Fourie
2 months on NCG Top 100s
Verified reviews
Checked and approved by NCG Top 100s before it was published.
A Properly Good Golf Course – Just Don’t Forget Your Legs! Kendal Golf Club is one of those courses that reminds you that golf doesn’t have to be 7,500 yards long and surrounded by £100 million worth of development to be bloody good. Founded way back in 1891, Kendal has some serious golfing pedigree behind it, with the course having links to names such as Old Tom Morris, Harry and Tom Vardon and J.H. Taylor. So before you start blaming the course for your score, just remember that some of the great names of the game have had a hand in shaping the place. No pressure then. The course itself is fantastic fun to play. At around 5,800 yards and a par 69, you might look at the scorecard and think, “This should be easy enough.” It isn’t. Kendal makes you think. There are elevation changes, blind shots, sloping fairways, deceptively tricky greens and plenty of holes where positioning is far more important than simply standing on the tee and attempting to remove the cover from the ball. And then there are the views. Absolutely stunning. The course sits above Kendal with huge views across the town and towards the surrounding Lakeland scenery. There are moments when you should probably be concentrating on your next shot but instead find yourself standing there thinking, “Christ, this is beautiful.” Which is usually followed by finding the bunker you weren’t looking at. The 17th deserves a special mention. A short par 3, but don’t let the yardage fool you. You’re playing over an old section of quarry wall, aptly named Battleship, and suddenly that little 129-yard hole feels like the 18th at Augusta when you’ve got a fiver riding on it. What I really like about Kendal is its character. It isn’t a bland, modern golf course where every hole looks the same. It has quirks. It has blind shots. It has hills. It has holes that make you think. And, occasionally, it has you standing on a tee wondering whether the person who designed the hole actually liked golfers. But that’s part of the fun. It’s also the sort of course that I think gets better the more you play it. Once you learn where you actually need to hit the ball rather than where your ego tells you to hit it, the course starts to reveal itself. And then, after you’ve battled your way around, there’s The View. Quite literally the perfect place to finish the round. Great hospitality, genuinely good food, a welcoming atmosphere and, of course, a cold drink waiting for you. It’s the sort of clubhouse experience where you can sit back, dissect the round, explain to your mates why that lost ball definitely wasn’t your fault and convince yourself that the next round is going to be different. If you’re visiting the Lake District and enjoy your golf, I’d definitely put Kendal on the list. It’s historic, picturesque, challenging without being ridiculously long, and above all, fun. Just one piece of advice: Don’t judge the course by the yardage on the card. Judge it by how your legs feel walking back to the clubhouse. And when you get there, make sure you head into The View. Because a cracking round of golf deserves a cracking end to the day. Kendal Golf Club – great golf, incredible views, plenty of character and a clubhouse worth sticking around for. Highly recommended.
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