Your ultimate Murray River golf guide

The mighty Murray River – the third longest navigable waterway on earth – is Australia’s greatest river with a majesty that enthralls hundreds of thousands of visitors every year. This holiday-maker’s playground has an ideal year-round climate, incredible natural beauty, historical sites and has gained a reputation for great food and wine.

There is also an abundance of riches for the traveling golfer with more than 20 courses to be enjoyed between Albury and Coomealla in what is now widely regarded as Australia’s best-valued golf holiday region.

ALBURY TO COROWA

The challenging Thurgoona Country Club Resorton the north-eastern outskirts of Albury, is one of the most underrated layouts to be found along the Murray River and is regarded by many as some of the best design work by Peter Thomson and Mike Wolveridge.

The par-72 layout has gained wider acclaim in recent years as the host of the NSW Senior Open, which has seen the likes of heralded players including Peter Lonard, Peter Senior and 1991 Open Champion, Ian Baker-Finch, compete for the trophy.

Thurgoona bears several Thomson and Wolveridge trademarks including rolling fairways, groups of mounds as well as strategically-placed and visually intimidating bunkering.

But it is the huge greens that offer the greatest challenge at Thurgoona. From the tee, most of the fairways are generously wide, but heading for the green on each hole is fraught with all sorts of dangers. Many of Thurgoona’s greens are raised above the level of the fairway and, despite their size, will deflect mis-hits well away from the putting surface. Small mounds built into the edges of the greens make chipping a thoughtful task.

The good design is complemented by its great year-round condition. In winter, it is possible to see the white peaks of the Snowy Mountains while walking the manicured couch fairways and putting on some of the best bentgrass greens in the area.

The 173-meter par-3 16th is one hole you will remember long after you have left the course. This is Thurgoona’s signature hole and from the tee an intimidating scene confronts you. Water from the front of the tee stretches to the green and wraps around the right towards the back of the putting surface. The green is wide but all that water sitting in front of you can be enough to add tension to the muscles in your arms and shoulders.

From Thurgoona, it is an easy 15-minute drive to the picturesque Albury Commercial Golf Club.

There are only a handful of courses in Australia that can claim the great Jack Nicklaus once held their course record. This is one of them.

The Golden Bear was in his prime in 1971 when he visited the course for an exhibition match and posted a four-under-par-67, breaking the course record by two shots. It took decades for Nicklaus’ record to be bettered, and was one that couldn’t even be lowered by the likes of Greg Norman, Billy Dunk and Brett Ogle.

These great Australian players would have found tight fairways and small greens. Mis-hits to either are heavily penalised.

Accuracy is the prime importance at Albury. At 355 meters, the par-4 3rd is not a long hole by any means, but it is still rated the toughest on the course. Bungambrawatha Creek runs along the right of the narrow fairway before cutting across the front of the green. The approach must be played over the creek to reach a dish-like green, guarded by bunkers left and right.

Albury is an undulating layout, far more than any other Murray course found to the west, and rarely offers the same shot twice. The 339-metre par-4 8th is a prime example. It is a terrific short par-4 where the drive is played through a chute formed by large pine trees to a rollercoaster fairway that cambers slightly from right down to the left. Ideally, the best position to approach the elevated green is from a flat lie in the ‘valley’. But many a player is caught with an uphill or downhill lie making it a difficult short second shot to a small green.

Albury is a border twin city with Victoria’s Wodonga, which is home to Wodonga Golf Clubabout five minutes’ drive from the bridge spanning the Murray.

The Kevin Hartley-designed course lies in the shadows of Hunchback Mountain, which is visible from most parts of the course (except for those spots regularly visited under trees and shrubs) and provides an eerie backdrop, while Felltimber Creek winds through the middle of the course creating its own challenges on several holes.

Heading west along the Riverina Highway from Albury, you will find one of the prettiest courses to be found anywhere along the Murray River. Halfway between Albury and Corowa is the Howlong Golf Resort – a gem of a layout that is easy on the eye but demanding on your game.

You will be impressed with the colorful flower gardens, lake and fountain beside the 6th green, in front of the clubhouse. But the quality of the layout will also leave you with no doubt Howlong is not a bed of roses.

Howlong’s greens are outstanding and are arguably the truest putting surfaces in the area. A green rebuilding program in the 2000s saw the bentgrass greens almost double in size, and designer Kevin Hartley incorporated only subtle breaks which can make them challenging to read.

Howlong only measures 5,689 meters from the tips but there are two par-4s that defy the ‘short’ course tag. The 400-metre 6th and 420-metre 7th are brutal holes. When the 6th, a dogleg right, is played into a prevailing breeze, the 7th, offers an assisting tailwind … a good case of the lord giveth and the lord taketh away. A pair of pars through these two holes is rare; bogeys and double bogeys are not. Both holes feature large greens that slope steeply away at the sides so a long second, or third, shot must be accurate.

Howlong has some very good short holes as well. Two appear consecutively on the back nine – the 320-metre par 16th and the demanding 195-metre par-3 17th. A long-iron or fairway wood is the best option from the 16th tee to ensure you find the fairway. A drive hit too far down the left of the fairway will find a bunker just inside the seemingly endless row of pine trees. Find the fairway and a short iron approach is all that is needed. On the 17th, accuracy with a long club is a must from the tee to split the narrow corridor created by large trees left and right. As you might expect on such a long par-3, the green is large and inviting.

When a group of prominent businessmen and politicians met for the Federation Conference in 1893, the little Murray River town of Corowa – about 25 minutes’ drive west of Howlong – was thrust into the national spotlight.

The conference was held at the local courthouse and a decision was made to draw up a constitution for the new nation.

These days, Corowa is world renowned as a great skydiving venue and the links with Federation are still visible driving through town. There’s a Federation Hotel, Federation Cafe, and even a Federation Museum.

The quiet achiever over the years has been the Corowa Golf Club. Although the club was founded just after Federation and began as a nine-hole sand scrape course where the local high school can be found today, the club didn’t move to its present site until 1955. Then, 18 holes were laid out on low land between the mighty river and a clubhouse. Another nine holes were added to the Old Course, east of the clubhouse, in 1980. Designed by veteran course designer Al Howard, the third nine differs greatly in character to the Old Course and certainly adds to the variety of golf Corowa offers.

RIGHT: Corowa Golf Club. PHOTO: Brendan James.

The opening hole of the East Course sets the tone for the nine. At 509 meters, this dogleg par-5 sweeps gradually left around the edge of a lake. The green is easily the size of two greens from the Old Course and is set in an amphitheater created by some well-sculpted mounding.

For me, the East Course nine played with the back nine of the Old Course (1-18) is the most challenging and interesting of the layout combinations.

The Old Course back nine leads away from the clubhouse in the direction of the river and the 502-meter par-5 11th goes a long way to get you to the edge of the Murray in a hurry. A wall of mature gums and pines, left and right, make this a very tight slight dogleg right hole that is a genuine three-shot par-5.

Corowa – the home club of former Tour pro and Olympian Marcus Fraser – has an enormous variety of holes, which have been complemented in recent years with significantly improved conditioning of its fairways and bentgrass greens.

Another feather in Corowa’s cap is that it is one of two clubs along the Murray that boasts a cinema in its clubhouse precinct. Golf, dinner and a movie…sounds like a plan.

YARRAWONGA TO MOAMA

Yarrawonga is home to the ‘newest’ course to be found anywhere along the Murray.

Black Bull Golf Club – five kilometers east of the main street – opened its first holes in 2010 with the remainder coming into play in 2015 and today it is one of the most highly regarded courses along the majestic river.

In fact, it debuted in Golf Australia magazine’s Top-100 Courses ranking in 2016 and has been there ever since. In January this year, it was ranked No.80 in the country.

Black Bull is quite different to all its neighboring courses.

Most notably it is located south of the Murray on the Victorian side of the border – making it the first river course built since Wodonga Golf Club opened for play in 1983 – long after poker machines had ceased to fuel the development of the big Murray River clubs like Yarrawonga Mulwala, Cobram-Barooga, Rich River and Murray Downs. All, of course, are found just north of the border in NSW.

On course, Black Bull offers wide fairways, big greens, expansive bunkering and subtle mounding. There have been trees planted across the property, but mostly form a green barrier between the course and the surrounding Silverwoods residential development.

In fact, one of the endearing characteristics of playing a round on this Peter Thomson and Ross Perrett-designed layout is the open space. The spacious Grand Prix couch fairways, punctuated by bunkers of varying shapes and sizes, expose players to breezes coming off nearby Lake Mulwala. These winds add to the challenge of avoiding several man-made lakes and streams that come into play on nearly a dozen holes.