Where Elephant Golfs

14th hole feature big water trap and 7
large bunkers! 313 yards (from silver tee)
par 4, GO FOR IT!

Coal Creek Golf Course one of the three new courses in Edmonton surrounding area opening in the summer of 2012 feature its own very unique feature, black sand in greenside and waste bunkers. (For course stats please see below)

My friends and I headed out of Edmonton at 2:30 and arrived within and hour on a beautiful Saturday afternoon (Aug 11th 2012). The Hole 2, 3, and 4 can be seen from Range Road 182 on the way coming south form highway 14. All my friends and I look at the course, then look at each other, and one of use let out, "this is going to be a GOOD round". We had somewhat high expectation for this course and at a glance, it was better than our expectation. There is no real pro shop yet, they are using one of the event barn for temporarily pro shop, which is fine.

Our tee time is at 4:10pm. We are playing twilight golf/walking which only cost 42 dollas + tax (sorry no pictures of power cart). The range was free to use for paying guest, and the pull card was free to use as well. The range is grass range with nice target greens, but no yardage marks. There is also practice bunker and green near the driving range. However, the bunker was full of water and was unfinished. I wish I could have practice on the black sand before going out for the round. I would recommend going to the practice green near the 1st tee since it was in better condition and simulate the actual green more. Cautions: Greens here are extremely fast (Puddicomb!).

Practice Green beside the first tee, over looking first fairway.

Tee boxes are in excellent shape! The hole indicator at each holes are just awesome, very unique and its keep reminding us that we are golfing on a mine!

Amazing Tee Sign, over looking 5th fairway.

5th Tee box

Most fairways here are green, lush, and soft. Some of the fairways (eg. 10th) are hard and have dirt patches. I was expecting some fairway to be like this in the beginning since its a new course and will take time to mature up.

Approach Shot from 3rd fairway. Black sand bunkers look great!

Now about the BLACK SAND. This black sand is HEAVY. Be careful of these bunkers and they are place very strategically, some are quite deep, and it is very heavy. You will have to put in more effort to get the ball out compare to normal sand bunker. The sand will pull your club more than any other sand you have play in courses in Edmonton area. Nonetheless it is excellent feature of the course. The colour really contrast the fairway and the green, and it just make the course look so amazing.

Sand save? Black Sand bunker close up.

Overall we had a great fun round. Some of the hole are awesome. We were lucky that it was not very windy as the course is quite open and wind can play a major part on the majority of the hole. (not as open/bad as Whitetail, I would say).

We took about 5 hours to finish the round (4 people, walking). Walking distant from some hole to another can be quite long.

The course is awesome, I can't wait to go back there, and can't wait for the course to mature!

For more info, map, and course map please visit their website: http://coalcreekgolfresort.com/

click on the picture to enlarge, and don't forget to comment!

Statistic: TEE/Yards/Rating/Slope