Visiting my parents, my wife and I got the chance to meet up with our friends Bettina and Mario to play some golf. Their home club was hosting a tournament, so they picked a course behind Ulm that we would play that sunday. Golfclub Reischenhof is situated in the countryside near Illertissen and features 27 holes on hilly meadows covered with apple trees, thus neatly fitting into the agricultural countryside. We arrived there on 09:30 on a sunday morning and the clubhouse was still closed, so we put our greenfee in the deposit box and walked over to the driving range through the converted barn, now serving as the locker room for the members. The whole course was covered in dense fog, so we were oly able to see some 100 - 150 meters. The first sings of live we saw on the putting green, it was freshly cut and - despite being wet from the fog - so friggin' fast, you just tickled the ball and it ran like Carl Lewis in his best times. After our warmup, we proceeded to the first tee, about to play the A/B combination of the course, named Hörnle and Autenweiler. The first hole already showed us what we had to expect from this course: downhill, uphill and sidehill lies (almost as extreme as Castro Marim), trees or water hazards, demanding a solid club and course management and extremly fast greens. Keeping the ball in the fairway was the key to good scores on this baby, as already the semirough imposed a challenge, being wet and extremly thick. The tee shots on the second and fourth were a great visual challenge, as you had to play over a large biotope - that looked like a jungle in the dense morning fog - to a steep uphill dogleg fairway. As all of us played the course for the first time, it really was an interesting challenge to place the ball where you wanted it, especially with the ball jumping right or left on the sidehill sloped fairways. The par 3's on the front nine were my friends as I birdied both of them, my only golf round with two birdies so far in my young golfing career. The birdie on the third was a 30m lobwedge from outside the green that hit the first cut and gently picked up speed as it rolled downhill towards the flag and fell into the cup with a solid plock. The second birdie I kind of owe Mario as he was first off on the fourth hole. His seven iron landed behind the green of the 140m downhill hole. I had a seven iron in my hand but changed it to an eight iron. Good choice, as the length was perfect and the ball rolled within 1,5 meters of the pin. The putt found the hole, as I could rely on my good putting just as the weeks before. The course is very interesting, yet demanding both physically and psychologically. You feel like a chamois climbing up and down the fairways, you really have to concentrage on club selection and alignment due to the undulated course. But you are rewarded with a beautiful nature and scenery as with challenging holes. You cannot see the greens on most of the holes unless you are within 100m of the pin. Never played so many blind shots in my life. The 16th hole is a perfect example hereof. It is a dogleg right played over two creeks, the green is surrounded by large trees and the fairway is framed by high bushes on both sides. You better buy a birdie book before your round to get your game together. One thing I disliked about the course was the bad signposting, being between the holes to find the way to the next tee or being it the signs with the hole layouts. As a stranger to the course, a little more help would be highly appreciated. All in all the course is highly recommendable, interesting to play with whatever handicap you might have. The daily greenfee is 60 EUR on weekends and 45 EUR on weekdays - that is per day, you can play as many holes as your feet may carry you. The clubhouse is very modern with a friendly staff, the pro shop is standard equipped. The club has no website, so use the information on golf.de or give them a call on 07353/1732 for further inquiries. read more

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