Apple Nine at Lyman Orchards Golf Club

Fun course. Nice practice facility . Only problem is there is always lessons with tons of people that have no clue how to play and take up all the space on the practice area . Seems like a cash making machine .

I brought my two grandsons along fully intending to grab membership documents to join next season and wanted to evaluate the 9 hole course as I had never played it. I have enjoyed a round on each of the other 18 hole courses last year. Upon arriving we we greeted with a lack of signage and a completely full parking lot. After walking about a quarter mile to the proshop, we were told that the Apple 9 course was in another area . Ok, my mistake, no problem. We drove to the Apple 9 parking lot and found the proshop. I paid for greens fees and carts and walked out to get our clubs. Unlike most courses I frequently play, you are not allowed to load your cart in the lot. ... Ok, again not a deal breaker. I paid for practice balls for each of us as well as several other items in the proshop(tees, balls, a cellphone holder)... not an insignificant sum... We again ran into signage issues related to practice areas. The practice putting greens were covered with balls; they didn't have actual holes, and there were people chipping onto them, leading us to believe there must be another dedicated putting area... Nope. We drove our carts around the building looking for a less dangerous area (no chipping going on) but that didn't exist. Instead, we were yelled at for crossing the edge of the parking lot... We retreated to a practice green near the first tee and spent a couple minutes practicing since we had about 25 minutes before our tee time. The starter came out and told us that a clinic was at the first tee, so we should jump to the 2nd hole so as not to be delayed by the large clinic group... Ok, no good warm up but better than waiting behind the clinic group. We got to the second tee and had to wait while a family (husband, wife, and three kids) played the hole... Very slooooow.. We waited on the 3rd hole hoping they would wave us through... Nope. We decided to skip ahead a hole to speed up our play.

At this point I will point out that the tee boxes were abysmal and the greens were aerated and rather rough. Quite a departure from the greens I remember from the 18 hole Jones/Player courses.

We finished out the 9th hole and drove around to play hole one and four which we had skipped. I traversed the edge of the parking lot on the sidewalk. This is the only way the carts must pass to get to hole one. I got to the first hole but my grandsons were stopped by an employee who yelled at me about going through the parking lot. I attempted to explain to her that the starter had asked us to skip hole one, but she wasn't having it. She yelled that we should walk the hole leaving the carts I paid for behind. She also told me she didn't care what I had to say and that I was "crazy"... Nice customer service skills. I went into the proshop to hopefully speak to someone a bit more rational but there apparently wasn't anyone around.

Bottom line: I spent nearly $200 for a substandard 9 holes of golf for 3 people plus extras. My intention was to have a great experience that would cement my intention to buy memberships for my grandsons and myself for next year. This experience deeply soured my previous good experience on the other two courses to the point where I will never return to any Lyman facility.

wet tee shot and sandy green.

It's worthy to play cheap price.