THE DESERT THEME

hbdeveloper
On May 21, 2014

This is the fourth in a series of a mini-articles about the Themes in The Golf Club following on from The Alpine Theme, The Rural Theme and The Autumn Theme posts. Themes are the various environments that the Greg Norman Course Designer uses when creating a course and describe the terrain, the flora, the fauna, the water, the tees, the fairways, the rough, the greens and the surrounding land.

Teeing off in the Desert Theme

The Desert Theme is the most extreme of the Themes in The Golf Club providing a rugged challenge to all levels of player. It is based on the lowland deserts of Arizona and Nevada where temperatures are high, vegetation limited and imposing mountain ranges stand in the distance.

Examples of vegetation in The Desert Theme

Due to the arid environment vegetation is limited to cacti, bushes, shrubs and grasses thus sightlines are very rarely affected should you stray from the fairway. However, the terrain away from the safety of the short stuff is not a fun place to be. Not least because of the snakes that tend to dislike being disturbed! There are some non-indigenous options such as palm trees included for cosmetic upgrades (just for you johneric8!).

A goat in the Desert Theme.

The playing conditions are everything you would expect from a course located in the desert. The fairways are hard and bouncy allowing for some enormous drives if you get the wind behind you and a downhill run but thus are quite difficult to control. Awareness of slopes and dips is important if you aren’t to roll into a nasty bunker or run off the fairway.

The fairway and light rough in The Desert Theme

Greens are fast. Stopping the ball with approach shots is a challenge and putting needs to be treated gently. Positioning on the green is crucial to a successful round because long putts are very difficult to judge. The ball can run and run.