Review: The Golf Club at the Equinox (Part 1)

It's April, and spring is in the air. So there's really no better time to take a look at a golf course I played in Vermont during peak fall foliage season. To be fair, I got some pretty good pictures.

It doesn't get much more New England than this. There's even a church steeple in the background.

The Golf Club at the Equinox (now to be more elegantly called 'Equinox') is associated with the Equinox resort (a real shock right there). It is, quite simply, an amazing spot to play golf. The views, as you can already see, are incredible. However, there is a bit of a elephant in the room. Equinox, as it turns out, is the younger sibling of Ekwanok Country Club, the golf course next door. And that's not hyperbole in any way. Equinox was originally designed by Walter Travis in 1925, whose first design was Ekwanok, which was built in 1900. (He also did Cape Arundel.) And when I say next door, I mean you can see Ekwanok through the trees from the fourth hole at Equinox. The fourth green here and the twelfth at Ekwanok are less than 100 yards apart.

That brings us to the aforementioned elephant. While Ekwanok is a basically pure Travis course (and extremely private, even by private course standards) and generally considered to be the best course in Vermont, Equinox was modified and redesigned by Rees Jones in the early 1990s. While the routing remained the same, things were changed elsewhere, and probably not for the better. There's a reason the Jones style of design has fallen out of favor. Still, Equinox is considered to be one of the best public courses in the state (it's a small state, but still), so it can't be all bad, right?

The first hole is a fairly gentle start to the round. At 350 yards, there's no need to use a driver on the tee since this isn't the widest fairway in the world. There's O.B. right and a couple of bunkers left, and a fairway wood is more than enough to leave a wedge for the second shot. The green is protected by bunkers right, short left, and beyond. It's not a big green either. Still, the hole is short enough to make birdie a definite possibility. 

The first hole.

The first green.

The second hole is about 400 yards and plays gently uphill. It goes in the same direction as the first hole and is straight, also like the first hole. There's a lot more room to work with, so a driver is fine here, but if you're an especially long driver the pond on the left can come into play. The green has a fair amount of tilt from back to front and is guarded by three bunkers. Another fairly straightforward hole.

The second hole.

Approaching the second green.

The second green.

The third hole is another mid-length par 4, this one with a fairway tilting notably from left to right. There are a couple of bunkers on the right side of the fairway, but a solid driver can take them out of play. There's a lot of room left, but the angle into the green is not ideal and the green is tilted away. Approaching from the right, near the bunkers and the O.B., gives a much more favorable second shot. 

The third hole.

Approaching the third green.

The third green.

The fourth hole is where you can start to see the Walter Travis influence. I highly doubt Rees Jones would build a par 3 like this, a short 160 yard hole that goes straight up a hill to a semiblind green. The green is tilted from back to front and is pretty shallow, so this is one you definitely won't want to miss long. 

The fourth hole.

The fourth green.

Three greens in one picture illustrates the compact routing of the front nine. In order of proximity, the fourth, seventh, and third greens.

The fifth hole is a short par 4, playing 335 yards and downhill the whole way. This is a funky little hole, playing only slightly downhill through a shallow valley for the first 175 yards, then plunging several dozen feet to the green, which is tilted from left to right and protected by three bunkers on the right side. You can lay up with an iron off of the tee, leaving a long approach from a fairly level lie, or you can use a driver, take aim just to the left of the big mountain peak and get as close to the green as you can. I tried to play conservatively, but my iron went wide right and out of bounds, so if I were to play here again, I'd definitely use a driver. It's the more fun option by a wide margin as well, seeing a driver sailing against the mountain and down the hill.

The fifth hole.

Approaching the fifth green.

The fifth green.

The sixth hole plays back up the hill the fifth went down, so despite being basically the same length it plays a lot longer. There are no bunkers around the fairway, so there's plenty of space to use driver and get as close to the green as you can. But the green is guarded by a bunker right in front, in addition to a few left and right. That means an approach from 50-75 yards can be awkward to get close to the hole. You need a high approach with spin to really get at the flag, so despite the open fairway it may be worth it to use a bit of restraint on the tee shot.

The sixth hole.

Approaching the sixth green.

The sixth green.

The seventh hole is the sole par 5 on the front nine and the longest hole at Equinox. Though at 520 yards, it's not exactly a back breaker. The fairway is pretty wide, but there are a few bunkers on both sides of the fairway. And by a few, I mean 17 -- 9 bunkers left and 8 right. Going in any one of them will make it a challenge to get your second shot across the road about 175 yards from the green. Yes, this hole has a road in play as well. Not a busy road, but it's definitely there. The second shot, and the third if you've laid up, are uphill to a green surrounded by eight more bunkers, bring the total on this hole up to 25. Once again, it may be better to be cautious on this hole rather than blasting away and ending up in one of 2 dozen bunkers.

The seventh hole.

The second half of the hole is over a road.

Approaching the seventh green.

The seventh green.

The eighth hole is the same length as the second hole, just under 400 yards. The tee shot is steeply downhill, so using driver is probably not strictly necessary, considering the road is close by to the left and there's a narrow water-filled ditch right that can absolutely catch drives. A 3 wood can get you plenty close to the green. The approach is to an elevated green with the usual assortment of bunkers around it. The green itself is more interesting. The front section is in its own little punchbowl, and when the flag is there, shots will funnel down nice and close. If you're not in the bowl, however, the putt will be incredibly slippery. I have a feeling this green wasn't changed much during the redesign.

The eighth hole.

Approaching the eighth green.

The eighth green.

The ninth hole is 360 yards and plays gently uphill back toward the clubhouse. It's been a while since a hole was open enough for a driver, but this one is. No fairway bunkers, just a road to the right which is quite a ways off. Well, unless you're me and my brothers, in which case only one of us managed to not hit a huge slice over the road. A hundred yards of course left and we had to go right. Anyway, the approach is over a big bunker to a green sloping back to front with a massive tier running through the middle. A word of warning: if the hole is cut on top, do not end up above the hole. The odds of you overshooting the hole and ending up all the way down at the wrong end of the tier are very good. I speak from experience on that. Again, I'm guessing this green was always this way and wasn't softened. That's a good thing, I just had a bad time with it.

The ninth hole.

Approaching the ninth green.

The ninth green.

That's it for this week, next week we'll take a look at the back nine.