Brighouse Bay Par 3 Course - Course no 482

One of the quirks of trying to play every golf course in Scotland is that it's an ever-changing target, since we're finding new courses every few weeks.  When I started this blog, we thought that there might be around 625 courses in total, since one guy had already found and played 611 courses with 9 or more holes.  Pair play to him for trying, but he'd not counted any of the small courses with only Par 3 holes, hence our larger and more complete estimate.  For us, it's bizarre to exclude the Par 3 courses, particularly since some are absolute gems e.g. Kaimes and the fact that some Par 3s on 9 or 18 hole courses are shorter and easier than some to be found on certain Par 3 courses.  We'd not known that there was also a 9 Hole Par 3 course at Brighouse Bay, so it was quite a surprise to see this sign beside the Brighouse Bay GC car park when I played there on 12 March 2012.  We now have 640 courses on our list of Scottish courses and I fully expect that we'll find another few by the time we're close to finishing our challenge. 

I couldn't find a scorecard for the Par 3 Course but I'm hoping that I'll be able to pick one up when I get back to play the full Brighouse Bay Championship Course sometime later this year.  In the meantime, this is my estimate of the hole distances, with the scores I managed to make -

Hole             Yardage            Score               Putts

1                       70                          4                 2

2                       70                          3                 1

3                       80                          3                 2

4                       85                          4                 2

5                     130                          4                 2

6                       70                          3                 1

7                       80                          3                 2

8                       90                          3                 2

9                       70                          3                 1

Total               745                         30               15

The holes are mostly pretty easy, requiring little more than a short pitch.  The 5th is a bit more tricky, as shown here.  This is played from an elevated tee avoiding a water hazard.  The 8th is the real tester, though, played semi-blind uphill to a small narrow green located next to some gorse bushes.  The Par 3 Course was quite wet when I played it, but I guess that it will be a popular course in the Summer months when the adjacent caravan park and holiday lodges are busier.  And no doubt this will be the first ever course some young holidaymakers  will  play, before graduating to some stiffer tests in the years ahead.