The Bridges Golf Club

The qualifiers:

1. I almost exclusively only post positive reviews. Golf courses are a brutal business model and take a tremendous amount of effort to keep going.

2. I shot an 80 which is pretty decent for me - especially at a new track - so I'm not venting over my own poor play.

3. I got a "Hot Deal" so I'm not made about the cost.

4. I drove almost an hour to play the course based on the reviews here, so I've decided to add my own take.

The Review:

In person, the staff were great. But I drove an hour to play their course for the first time to find greens that were unplayable. Rooster tails of sand on every putt. Shaggy to the point of ridiculousness. How they don't let golfers know that upfront is beyond me. Tell me the situation, bait me with a good deal and let me decide. Deceive me and I'll never come back.

Even if the greens had been perfect, the layout is beyond contrived. There are dozens of these courses in California - built in canyons on land not suited to any other purpose. Problem is these tracks of land often don't lend themselves to golf, either. Tons of blind landing areas, awkwardly sharp doglegs, holes forced into the land available. Not my kind of golf.

Condition (beyond the greens) - because of the layout, one side of virtually every hole is a hazard. Problem is the other side is an overgrown mess of eight different kinds of grass and weeds. Often times, finding a ball a yard into the rough was a matter of luck. My playing partners were not particularly skilled golfers, but on a quality layout they could have kept golfing. With all of the hazards, rough and forced carries they went through a dozen balls in the first nine holes.

Which comes to my final point - the course was empty so our pace of play was decent. But if you're not a single-digit, there's no way to play this course in under 4.5 hours. You'll spend 2 just looking for balls.

Bonus take - worst walking course imaginable.

No yardage markers other than the 150 stake and on the cart path. Lots of blind holes so if playing for the first time, dont know where to hit. No course layout unless you purchase the yardage book at clubhouse. The staff did not tell us this at check in so assumed hole layouts would be available on the course or prior to each hole. With this type of course, need hole layout and yardage at least on sprinkler heads.

The Bridges is a very challenging course with forced carries and many ravines off the fairways. Some par 4s in the wind was very difficult for me to reach in two. I am a 16 handicap and 65 years old. Shot 89 and felt this was a good round for me. Staying on the fairway was paramount to my ability to score.

Beautiful course had a great time playing just a little too expensive should be less than 60 bucks

Don't expect to shoot well. The greens are a teepee shy of Pitt putt. Fast and ridiculous swells and jumps .

I'm. 2 handicap and yiu won't make a putt .

Fun layout

Great course, fairway was in great conditions and greens are remarkable.

Had a good time and was challenged by the course layout...

Had a great time playing The Bridges for the first time. Cool layout, great yardages, tough greens. Don't recommend playing if you're not hitting the ball straight. If you hit it straight and your game is in good shape, highly recommended!

The Bridges is in excellent shape:

-Smooth tee boxes

-Fairways like carpet

-Firm but true greens

For these reasons you must play there at least once - Just be mentally prepared. I played from the whites which is 6100 yds. I used driver 3 times. This is a placement course. Fairways are either narrow, or winding. If you do find a fairway then greens are usually accessable, but probably are not any flat puts. Nothing crazy mind you, but know where the undulations might be and try to stay below the pin.

I usually would not complain about a bad hole, but I am here: #14 is not a fair hole. I have no problem with a long hole, or a narrow one, but it seems the only reason this hole exists is to frustrate. the sign at the tee box reads(as close as I remember), "190 to gully/250 to carry." Tee shot is down hill, so maybe 230-235 to carry, but there is no room to miss left(tall growth) or right(hazard/OB). Just a narrow landing area over a 50yd chasm. So your lay up leaves you a 220-230 2nd shot up hill with long bunker on right side. Other than one simple par 3 the other holes provide a fair challenge - playing this course is good for your game - but #14 feels like a bad design that proves nothing.

Interesting and challenging layout and design. Need to bring your A game for this one. Great amenities and staff to boot.

I enjoy playing this course. The fairways and greens were in good shape. I recommend this course to avid golf players.

The fairways and the greens were in very good shape for this time of year. The round was a little slow at 4 hours and 45 minutes. The slow play was the group in front of us that was a hole behind and played from the back tee box with their 150 yard drives.

What an interesting round at The Bridges. We were very satisfied with the course and our round until the 16th hole when the group behind us “played through” by driving past us while we were teeing off. After informing them that we had been waiting for the group in front of us to to clear the fairway, they mentioned that one of the members of the foursome owned the course and that they didn’t see anyone ahead of us. We proceeded to play the hole when the group (including the “owner”) had to backtrack because they realized there was indeed a group ahead of us. To our surprise, instead of apologizing for attempting to play through without permission they mocked the location of our drives.

Considering the average conditions and the disrespectful management, I hope they took a picture of me because it’s the last time they’ll see me there.

This course was right near where I was staying and it was recommended to me the day before. If you do not hit the ball straight this course will punish you. For a course that is as nice as it is to not have GPS on the golf cart was strange I wasn't going to buy the golf book for $7 when I don't live in the area so that didn't make sense to me. The course was very wet when we played it didn't rain so they must water the course it made for a tough round and my clubs and shoes were full of mud when i was done.