Golf247 and I played a local "Yacht and Country Club" course yesterday.  This is one of the "nicer" neighborhoods in Jacksonville - and I've always wanted to live there because it is relatively close to the Beaches area (5 minute drive) and has a nice golf course and huge houses.  But...  And this became a big ol' "but" - I quickly began to have my doubts about this high-end neightborhood and that was just in the first few minutes/holes.   I hit the driving range just to end up fighting off tons of large annoying bug-spray resistant (but thankfully non-biting) bugs without getting any good practice in and then was lucky enough to see the gigantic hillside of a landfill in the not-so-far distance from several of the front 9 holes.  The back 9 is closer to the Intracoastal Waterway and has the bigger homes that come with deepwater yacht slips and views of the marsh/ICW.  This side of the 'hood seemed a lot nicer until we heard all the noise.  Helicopters from the Mayport Naval Station were overheard almost constantly (sounds of freedom I know) and the new expressway bridge they built to help get traffic to the Naval Station created more noise than I could have imagined.  I know anyone who lives near a highway or big bridge knows what I'm talking about - constant thumping of tires on the bridge or the sounds of trucks upshifting to get up the hill.  I was shocked how loud this peaceful area was and couldn't imagine how upset the residents probably were when they started building that bridge.  Oh and to add onto that, the marsh area around our fair city can be quite unpleasant during low tide when the mud is baking in the Florida sun.  Maybe you get used to the smell, but I can't envision sitting out on the patio and bathing in that odor for very long.  After talking about all this and trying to figure out if these million dollar homes were really worth it, we tried to rationalize it by saying how nice it would be to live on the course...  Being able to just walk out to your backyard and chip balls to an empty green or hit some drivers in the early morning before play started...  But slowly it sunk in how close the golf-view houses were to the course and after a couple loud pings of our drivers even that became a possible negative.  With how loud most of the new drivers are and coupled with the curses of random hackers all day long - I can't imagine a less relaxing atmosphere.  Maybe I'm wrong, but I know I've been guilty of saying a few choice words after hitting an errant tee shot, so I am not sure I'd want my kids to hear some of the things said just outside of my backyard fence.   So tell me again what makes these houses worth 200-300K more than my quiet non-golf/non-marsh view neighborhood home of the same size?  I know common sense says that golf and water views command premiums, but apparently all golf or water views aren't equal.  However if anyone from that neighborhood wants to swap houses with me because of the noise or bugs - I'd still consider it :)

 Oh well - still an enjoyable afternoon as we had a nice greens fee rate through lastminutegolfer.com and we weren't stuck in the office.  I ended up with a 97 which is pretty miserable especially since I was +12 on the 4 par 5's.  I almost pulled a Woody Austin on the first par 5 and still didn't manage to move my ball from the water despite getting a little wet from the resulting splash.  I should have listened to my partner and took the drop, but as he said "It was an experiment" - that went horribly wrong.  The 2nd par-5 got me with a terrible tee shot that went straight into the drink - one of those shots that you can't believe just came off your clubface even though they seem to happen once a round (maybe that's just me though).  So with the 8 and 9 on the front par-5's - I had a gorgeous 51 at the turn.  The 3rd par-5 got me with a 5-wood that I tried to hook under/around a tree - the result was 30 yds and a lie deeper in the woods.  I should have waited for my partner to bring the cart and my clubs over, but I got impatient and tried to hit another punch-out with the 5-wood.  Not sure what the heck I did and I'm not sure I could do it again no matter how many times I tried - but I double-hit the ball and added 2 more strokes on...  So another 9 went on the card and it seemed like the wheels were officially off my game.  But then I got a little momentum back with a nice 185-yd 5-wood to about 3-4ft from the hole on the 2nd par 3 of the back - and of course missed the putt.  Durrr...  Ended the back-9 with a 46 that was only marred by the quad on the par-5.   So I managed to turn a mid-80's round into a high-90's round just by virtue of impatience and a lack of concentration...

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Tony said:

	Nice blog!
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April 03, 2008
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