Nick6844119

Quite a number of blind holes on he Salgado course and a few holes where we had to ask directions to the next tee. Not a very visitor-friendly course. We even had to ask directions to the pro shop upon arrival in the parking area. Fairways were rather hard which meant that club selection was problematic at times and greens had grass that either caused a fast or slow roll depending on which way the grass was mowed. The layout is Interesting and there were some nice elevation changes.

Sometimes they start everyone on the 10th which is putting your best foot forward since the back nine is fun and challenging and often dramatic. Designed around the hollowed-out section of an abandoned cement rock quarry, the wind is coming from ever-changing directions. The flag may be showing west while the tee box may be blowing east! And if your long shots are a bit off, there are rock outcroppings aplenty and a couple of opportunities to get your ball wet. Front nine is boring in comparison and layed out like other courses in the area.

Nicely laid out and well maintained course. Some of the holes were more picturesque than others, but the very pretty holes were a joy. The tee boxes for the most part were very hard and I broke several tees simply trying to get them into the ground! Greens were a bit bumpy and rather fast. And since the pin placement was on the difficult side, a putt that would have been left two or three inches long, suddenly turned into 10-12 foot putts or even ended up off the green entirely. The water features on this course are wonderful, at least today due to all the rain this spring. We love playing a round here even though the pace of play is noticeably slower than we're used to at other San Antonio area courses.

In a nutshell, a fairly flat, fairly easy, inexpensive, short, 9-hole facility located in a modest, older, Northeast San Antonio neighborhood. The facility seems frozen in time - 1950, or so - and a good portion of the place is in serious need of updating, or at least some serious TLC. I must say, however, that the course itself is not all that bad - a notch or two better than Alamo Golf Club, a comparable, inexpensive course in the Northwest part of town.

Bordered by four city streets, there are ample opportunities to scuff up a ball or two on the asphalt and perhaps ding up a car parked in a nearby driveway.

Four holes may require a driver - 1, 2, 5 and definitely 9; three holes are relatively short par threes - 3, 6 (with a well-designed water hazard complete with spewing fountain in the middle) and 7; 4 is a dogleg right and 7 is a dogleg left, both relatively short holes requiring well placed tee shots.

I have played this course several times and almost every time I end up behind a foursome of elderly golfers, which this course seems to cater to. Today it was a four elderly ladies with another foursome of elderly gents playing immediately ahead of them. I politely asked to play through and the ladies agreed, while the elderly gentlemen made no effort to be accommodating. So my 9 holes took a while. Oh well, it was a beautiful day and I took advantage of the slow play to hit two or three balls on every hole.

If you play 18 holes here, the back tees are just far enough back from the white tees to make the course feel different, so I play the blue tees on the "front" and white tees on the "back."

Amenities are spartan although there is one water station midway and another on the 1st tee. They have a batter's cage that serves as a warm-up, although it is falling apart and the backstops torn and tattered in many spots. I didn't bother since the mat was waterlogged and missing the tee.

There is a small chipping green that is really rather well maintained although the grass surrounding it was very uneven - some way too tall and some spots bare and some spots just right.

I have to admit that I do use this course a couple of times a month for a practice round because it's so cheap. Just like me.

One would hope that a resort golf course would be at least playable. This one is not. We played this 9-hole course several months ago and were pretty disappointed, but we thought we'd try it again to see all the improvements so we showed up in time for the twilight rate. We were surprised that the course had actually taken several steps backwards instead of improving. We paid for 18 holes but gave up trying to play this wreck of a course after 9 frustrating holes. Shoot down the middle of the fairway and lose a ball! Not once or twice, but several times. There was high grass and debris all over the course from various trees, piles of hay (cut grass) and don't even think about being in the short rough. The grass was so tall there and so filled with leaves that finding a ball was impossible. Greens were lumpy, bare in spots, long in others and filled with all sorts of unknown types of grasses and weeds. Tee boxes were passable at least. And good thing the golf cart was durable because it sure got a workout banging into fairway potholes and trying to cross city streets with major curbs to bounce over. . Cart paths? What are those? There's one at the start, but you're on you own thereafter. There are several very good courses in Corpus Christi, but this is not one of them.

Hard to find balls even on the fairway since there are so many golf-ball sized rocks on the course. The back nine is much greener than the front nine and more fun to play with some excellent par three holes and a couple of longer dog-legged holes. When the ball winds up on a rock-hard, grassless lie, we simply move the ball to the nearest weed or grassy patch, so scores are practically meaningless on this course. The driving range is excellent and the practice putting green is very representative of the greens you will encounter on the course itself. I enjoy playing the course simply because the green fees are cheap and I need all the practice I can get!