Royal Oaks Golf Club

Course was in bad shape...

I used to play this course about 10 years ago and it was in much better shape than it is now. Still enjoyed the layout, but fairways are not near what they used to be.

Royal Oaks is an average public course in most ways and below average in some. I wouldn't say it's above average in any way.

Staff is friendly.

Course itself is in decent shape but not in the top ten or even 15 of local public courses. Greens are soft and spongy and balls don't roll true. Amenities around the course are lacking. No drinking water anywhere. Ball cleaners sometimes dried out. Yardage marking inadequate. Bunkers are especially bad, with only a thin layer of sand (calling it sand is not accurate - it's small, sand colored stones and grit) over a hard packed clay-like base. I feel like I'll break a club trying to hit out of any bunker.

Fairways are pretty nice, rough is challenging.

Never saw a marshal on the course to keep pace of play up.

Value is good though. It's inexpensive and they participate in GolfNow Hot Deals.

Overall, I'd play it if they are running a special, but otherwise I'd probably not. I've played this course a half dozen times in the past three years.

Course conditions are good and the pace of play was under 4 hours. The perplexing thing is that there is no drinking water on the entire course. This is problematic if it is hot and you forget to buy water before teeing off. Literally the only golf course that I have ever played with no drinking water. They need to fix this.

This is a nice course with a good variety of holes. The course was in good shape.

I guess starting on hole 1 is normal but this morning was real busy. We asked about starting back nine first and was told no. Started on hole 1 but we were behind group of two who were behind group of four. Pace of play was very slow. After our round the course was basically empty so there shouldn't have been a problem starting on #10

Good condition with friendly staff and a small restaurant. We would play this over and over.

Solid design, needs TLC. Given price point, attracts a fair number of "hackers" who need some etiquette - e.g., was on 17 green and group on 18 tee slices shot onto 17 green with nary a "fore". Painful to watch them hack up the course hole after hole...One and done.

Golfing in December is always a big question mark in Pennsylvania. Warmer than normal weather has allowed me and my buddies to continue to golf, well beyond what is normal here in the north east. The course was open for business and not in bad shape considering the late date. The greens were nice and fast with a few bare spots. Still better than many of the other local courses which are in horrible shape. Fairways were very respectable. The overall facility was in good shape. We had fun. The food prices were stupidly high! I won't buy food or drink here again unless it's a last resort.

The fairways were in good condition. The greens rolled well, a few had a lot of ball marks which were not the fault of the course. PEOPLE, PLEASE FIX YOUR BALL MARKS!! The green side sand (?) traps were horrible, very little or no sand to be found, we played some as Ground Under Repair. Took a friend from Philly for his 1st time playing Royal Oaks & he can't wait to come play it again.

I'm happy to say that this course has improved over the past several months since the summer season. It looks like they are trying to improve the conditions of the course.

The greens are very slow right now and the traps need work but I am looking forward to seeing this course in the spring.

Fairways and tee boxes are improving slowly. You can tell someone with new ideas is trying to make some needed improvements. For spring, they need a lot more sand in the sand traps as it is more like cement with pebbles in it and that was true earlier in the season too. Especially the green side bunkers need more sand in volume and quality.
The greens are not cut nor cared for consistently as too many were unusually slow (needing cut and less watering during the fall) and some were much faster irrespective of slope or grain. The greens need a lot of care and focus to bring this back to a four star course that rivaled the CC across the street at one time in terms of its conditions.
The variation in architecture and layout is still a lot of fun! It needs to be a value play until conditions approach a slight step down from Iron Valley in quality level while keeping to its own style.

Hot Deal was great. Overall conditions were good but the majority of the sand traps were rocky.

The greens were a little rough this has always been a problem with this course...otherwise good condition

I really like this course. The greens were below the normal condition. Holes 13-17 are really challenging. There was a foursome in front of us that was really slow, the round took 4:45.

Staff very friendly course is in good shape enjoyed the round

I haven't played this course in about 10 years. Back then it was one of the finest courses in the area. I don't know if weather conditions have contributed to the course condition or if the maintenance of the course has dwindled. From tee boxes to greens this course has taken a nose dive compared to how it looked and played years ago. I saw no Marshall's on the course to keep an eye on slow play. There also were no water coolers on the course, so make sure if it's hot, which it was, bring your own. It wouldn't take a whole lot of work to bring this course back to the excellent condition it was years ago. It has a beautiful layout with challenging holes. Just needs some TLC.

Played here a few times before and enjoy playing it every single time.

Like a lot of courses I've played this year, the greens are in bad shape. To the credit of the staff they top dressed them in an effort to save them or at least not letting them get worse. The rough has weeds....

I stopped by this course while in the area a while back in the spring and it was packed so there was no playing then. I wanted to come back and did so today ... a very nice layout with some good challenges but the course condition itself was disappointing. The greens were pock marked - clearly patrons don't care about repairing ball marks. There were many greens that were patchy. Sprinklers were on on at least half the holes I played so much so that there were rivers of water on the greens making them unplayable even though I was on in regulation. Sand traps were crusty and hard. Fairways were average at best.

It's a shame because the layout itself is clearly very good and could present an awesome round if in good shape. $25 with cart is a fair price but I don't think I would return based on what I saw today.