Basildon isn’t polished around the edges (for examples, the sand hazards didn’t have rakes in them and their edges weren’t cleanly groomed), but its fundamentals (eg. green surfaces, fairways, layouts) are superb. Its more relaxed ambience combined with a very dog-friendly demeanor takes any stress out of the apprehension of dog walking even, off-lead.

Welcome:  While there were no fellow dog golfers, we did come upon dog walkers on the fairways a couple of times. When we stopped for a 9^th hole drink, the shop/café/bar manager came out with a dog bowl of water for Rusty and Grace without being asked. In fact, dogs are allowed in the small clubhouse and its bar. When we stopped at the end of our round, several best friends were sitting there with their owners.

Water: No spigots on the course and the only water hazard is right next to the pro shop where a few feet away you can get fresh tap water.

Walk: The course topology is sort of giant parabolic humps. It was the total inversion of Manor of Groves. Sort of like its yoga counter pose (instead of down-and-up from one elevated ridge to another, it is up-and-down over a single ridge). If you can get your drive over the top of the looming hill, then you will get a decent bonus distance as it rolls down the other side. It gave Grace an opportunity for some ball-sniffing outside the rough even if they did go straight down the fairway. You are driving over the top of a ridge that once you clear, you have no idea where you have landed.  Lori’s most frequent questions of the day was “I wonder where the pin is” (often followed by “Grace, find the ball!”). At least a third of the holes are “blind” in this way.

Go east young man’s best friend. Having done the vast majority of our golfing in the provinces just west of London, an annual social gathering got us to pack up our bags and head to Essex for the weekend. The event invites the whole family including the dogs so we figured we would take in a couple of rounds of dog golf – one en route there and one en route home.

Manor of Grove is a chance for those puppies to stretch their legs and the golfers to stretch their swings. The fairways are some of the widest I have seen. So unless your slice wouldn’t pass a European Union regulation for banana straightness, you have a chance to let loose with some real welly and the approach will be very forgiving to a moderate amount of veering. And just to boost your ego a bit more, the majority of holes run perpendicular to two long ridges. So you are going downhill on your drive. But be warned you will need to go *up* the other side. And naturally, water collects at the bottom of most valleys so most of these holes will have horizontal hazards running in front of you. Some of that water is feeding some very ‘healthy’ (ie. tall) growth that I swear has mutated tendril hands to grab your ball out of the air. If you will be tempted to go for the monster drive, but if you don’t think you can make it across, you could get sucked into the nadir of the abyss where the gravitational pull is strongest.

Welcome:  Everyone was very welcoming of Rusty and Grace though they did seem to be a bit of a novelty on the course to most.  As it turns out, they were a complete novelty because dogs are not actually allowed on the course.  We had previously received an email from the course confirming that they were allowed, but then after our visit, someone was so surprised to see them, that they checked the rules and told us that actually the rules prohibited dogs.  Oh well…an exclusive round of dog golf for Rusty and Grace.

Walk: As described above, the landscape is a bit of a Newton’s Cradle. Up and down, up and down. Nothing particularly steep. Just relentless. A variation of the Chumbawamba song (“I get to drive downhill, but then it goes up again…”).

Water: Quite a number of streams and water hazards, but in the mid-summer, they were all dried up. The 9^th hole finishes across the big parking lot from the pro shop and bar, but it was worth the walk for us to load up on liquids.

Going a bit upscale with our dog golfing now. As relatively novice golfers (average in the 30s and Lori average in the 40s), we haven’t made the investment into joining a club. On a good day, Lori and I will shoot under the maximum handicap (36 and 28 respectively), so we do need to think about joining a club so we can get our handicap cards (especially as some of the nicer clubs require them and the nicer clubs also tend to be more dog-friendly). We also tend to play the value priced courses (ie. under £30 per round) to get our practice and wayward shots out of our system. So our visit to Huntercombe Golf Club was a bit of an upgrade for us. They charge £90/round, though we still opted for the more economical evening (after 5:00 pm) rate of £50.

We were inspired by their off-lead policy. Much as the Rusty and Grace seem to do fine on lead, as Vizslas they really do prefer to be free to trot about more. As a result, we are pretty compelled to try every no-lead course within an hour’s drive of us in Marlow.

Huntercombe is more than just lead-free, but definitely puts the “friendly” into “dog-friendly”. With the strict etiquette in golf about not disturbing people while they are taking their shots, dog golfers like us are always extra worried that the dogs might let out a yelp or dash up to a player when they shouldn’t. As noted previously, some people are not dog fans (evidenced by the vast majority of clubs that do not welcome them), so one is naturally apprehensive about bothering them. When there are more dogs about in general, you feel like less of an anomaly. At Huntercombe, I would estimate that about a third of the fellow golfers on the day had dogs with them (see photo below). But it wasn’t just the dog golfers who made us feel at home. Every golfer we came up to, made a friendly comment about Rusty and Grace.

The course itself is a real curiosity. Like something designed by Dr. Seuss. No water hazards and only a few sand bunkers, but countless knolls and grass bunkers. Not gentle depressions in the landscape, but some plummeting abysses where the rest of the fairway is over your head. It felt more like Cherborg than the Chilterns. Maybe good for dodging machine-gun strafing, but not so great for stray shots. Sort of a version of 3D golf where you have to consider the elevation of hazards, not just their X/Y coordinates on the hole.

This topology leads to some quite surreal layouts. Like the Dali-esque 4^th green or the 17^th hole which resembles some medieval torture chamber. That said, Hole 2 is one of the favourite I have ever played. You tee off onto a gigantic downhill fairway that seems as forgivingly wide as it is long. And once you leave the tee past the surrounding trees, the view on the left opens up to this spectacular vista looking for miles over the Oxford Plain. To avoid a number of players, we had started our round on the 6^th hole and so we got to Hole 2 quite late in the day when the sun was low on the horizon and igniting the summer clouds with colour. The only thing that can ruin this gem is a monstrously long serpentine gully running perpendicular to the hole two-thirds of the way through the green so beware!

Welcome:  Huntercombe is more than just lead-free, but definitely puts the “friendly” into “dog-friendly”. With the strict etiquette in golf about not disturbing people while they are taking their shots, dog golfers like us are always extra worried that the dogs might let out a yelp or dash up to a player when they shouldn’t. As noted previously, some people are not dog fans (evidenced by the vast majority of clubs that do not welcome them), so one is naturally apprehensive about bothering them. When there are more dogs about in general, you feel like less of an anomaly. At Huntercombe, I would estimate that about a third of the fellow golfers on the day had dogs with them (see photo below). But it wasn’t just the dog golfers who made us feel at home. Every golfer we came up to, made a friendly comment about Rusty and Grace.

Walk: Huntercombe is one of the flatter courses we have walked making the 6100 length more comfortable (mind you, you do need grappling hooks and crampons to scale out of some of their hazards).

Water: A water spigot with a dog water dish by the 7^th hole as well as by the clubhouse (1^st hole and 5^th hole are there).

We have probably played Huntswood course in Taplow more than any other course in our brief golfing career. It is a favourite of our neighbors with who we golf with as a foursome more than all of our other golf buddies combined. Researching DogGolf, we found out they welcome dogs (though with a strict lead policy – in fact one of the staff came around on the course and stopped by us to remind us that they must be kept on the leads). So the 6 of us went out on our first Huntswood round dog golfing.

Rusty and Grace are getting ever more used to the drill and routine so they were pretty comfortable on the leads. Probably a good thing that they were so confined sincea resident fox on the 5^th/12^th was wondering around the fairway throughout the day and a throng of young bunnies were quite nonchalantly munching grass on the 7^th (both of which inspired *extreme* interest by Rusty and Grace). Grace continued her ball finding prowess though now I think she is rooting for us to hit our drives into the rough so she can get a treat.

Walk: While the course is a moderately sized 5188 metres, the layout is such that there a number of ambles between holes making the walk a bit longer. It is mostly flat except for a bit of a climb up the 17^th hole.

Water: No water on the course except at the clubhouse. Fortunately, the clubhouse is right next to the 9^th hole so you can detour in for a quick drink stop (where you can wet your whistle at the bar as well). Also, adjacent is a big water hazard, but it is an artificial pond so it dries out in the warmer months of summer.