The Rock Barn Country Club & Spa

I play quite a bit of Golf, have for many years, and now rotate weekly to various courses! Rock Barn is by far the nicest overall Golf Facility for public play in this portion of the state! Is it priced reasonably? Well, no its about $10 to pricey. Verdict Ridge Golf club is one of its closest competitors for this slice of the golfing market, and Seniors there can play for $15 less than RBarn on weekdays, however the environment, facilities and practice area at Rock Barn are nicer. Surprisingly Rock Barn is never packed/crowded like the aforementioned course, and several other courses in this area! The Bent Grass greens at Rock Barn are a major draw and roll far better than any Bermuda conversion I have ever played. The greens here are worth a few extra bucks for sure. The Jackson course is a nice ‘old school’ layout with lots of elevation changes, huge bunkers, and water and is extremely well maintained. it also has 2 new Restroom/water/ice facilities on the course as well. I actually like the Jackkson far better than the Jones course and it rather odd & inconsistent layout.

Been a few years since we’d played the Jackson Course, but always enjoyed coming up to Hickory area hoping to get a bit of relief from the central piedmont heat. Not sure it was much cooler, but humidity was down. Course was in as good a condition as I could remember, fairways, tees and greens. Not a long course from regular tees , but you use every club. Not very crowded on a Wednesday afternoon, so we moved around in well under 4 hours, even taking our time due to the warm day. Highly recommended if you can get on with a hot deal.

Some burnt out spots on greens and one or two bunkers had liners exposed; lots of pitch marks but I think it’s because they’re fighting the heat with bent greens. None of the conditions impacted play (dead spots on greens were far away from all of the pins etc). Tee box, fairway , and rough conditions were some of the best I’ve seen for public courses.

Course layout was great, fairways in good condition. Bunkers in good condition. Greens - beat up and dried out. There were also several kids fishing on the course on the back 9, standing all around where we were hitting - not ideal, not safe. Otherwise really enjoyed the day!

First off, the good stuff: great fairway grass, nice carts, top notch environment.

Now the less than Good: Some hole designs just made zero sense. Hole #4 is a horrible design, more especially if you can’t fly a 3 or 5 wood 240 yards. Any drive right of center has zero chance of setting you up for any lay-up shot to the fairway unless you can hit a major slice. And this is not just my opinion… as i stood over what was to be my second shot several course workers were nearby, they saw my bewilderment and said, “confusing huh” then told me that most regulars simply play to the 5th fairway way right over the water, then hit to the 4th green. Also the tee boxes for hole 3 & 16? are extremely confusing! You have like 6 or 8 tee boxes all in the same area sorta on an open air hill, and none give you any indication of what hole they are for! Thrown in the fact there are 2 greens just yards away. (#2 & #15?) and the entire area is weird! The course has a few attractive spots and holes however all these negatives killed any excitement I may have had for the place!

Really enjoyed our round. Fairways and greens were very good. Layout wonderful. Staff very helpful and friendly. We will be back soon!!!

Best greens we have play in Catawba played 18 holes in 3 hours

I’m fairly hard to impress when it comes to golf courses.. and I’ll rarely spend over $65 to play, however I was impressed with this place EXCEPT FOR the areas around #7 Tee Boxes as well as everything to the left of the length of this entire hole! Just plain ugly, snakey, eroded and not maintained! Its so bad as opposed to remainder of their 2 courses it had me scratching my head! The bent grass greens here will definitely keep me coming back here to play! Course fairways grasses were awesome and as good as you’ll find in the area. Nice bunkers and lots of them, my only issue was the fact that they were not consistent in their condition, maintenance and amounts of sand.

All in all.. and enjoyable outing!

Played early in a Sunday morning and the course was beautiful- well-maintained and the staff could not have been nicer or more helpful. Play got a little slow on the back 9 but the Marshall worked his magic in a timely manner. Will be back here again soon!

Front 9 is far more difficult and a less picturesque than the back. The Back 9 is magnificent and the views make you feel like you are playing a PGA course. Greens are tricky but far once you figure them out. I will play this course again in the near future

As long as they keep the price at $70 it is well worth it. Great course.