It's kind of been in the back of my mind to check out the El Paso golf scene, but I always put it off because I'm not a golfer. Wait, not only am I not a golfer, I've never in my entire life golfed. Maybe as a kid I played a round of putt-putt, but to the best of my knowledge I can't recall such an instance. I had literally never picked up a real deal golf club and that was a fact. 'Was a fact'.
After a little push from Yelper, Jake E., I started doing some research. I consulted with my boyfriend (who is a golfer) and when he told me about Horizon Golf Club and how it's been closed for a decade, give or take, I settled on them as my introduction to the world of golf. I was pleasantly surprised what I found out in the dusty city of Horizon.
We decided to start our trip by dining in the restaurant (which I will be leaving a separate review for), Moonlight Bar and Grill. I have been to Sandtrap at Lonestar Golf Course and was expecting something similar, but what I got was so much better. So much! It was a great start to our outing and had a great view of the 18th hole from the patio. If I'm in the area, this'll be my first stop for lunch or an early dinner.
Afterwards we picked up his clubs and headed to the clubhouse to get a tee time. The clubhouse is a little small and I kind of expected them to sell things like chips, sodas and beers since that's not exactly the atmosphere of MBG... but no beverages or snacks. No biggie, I was full anyway. The price for 18-holes and a cart for one person was pretty dang reasonable, only $27 and some change. They do charge per person in the golf cart, but there was no requirement for each person in the cart to play or for you to play with a group of four. There were quite a few people on the course and they did let us know a tournament just finished, but it didn't feel cramped at any point so maybe that's why they're so easy going with it all.
The course. Oh man, this course. Now, I've seen courses and I've been to a few for events so I've seen courses that have houses on the outskirts of it. You know the ones where people pay a little extra to live right on the golf course and when they're feeling like playing a round they just walk out their back door and up to the clubhouse. HGC's course is like that, but on acid. But I wasn't mad at it, it's just something you have to adjust to.
I was driving the cart to start with. The cashier at the clubhouse went over what areas I could and couldn't drive on, but all of that was mumbo-jumbo to me because I literally understood 0% of it. I nodded as if I did understand all the same. My driving started out a little too cautious I would say because I did not want to leave the path, but there are parts where the path turns to grass or dirt. My boyfriend explained the areas that I couldn't drive on (the tee box and the green) and luckily for me they labeled which areas they absolutely did not want to driving on so it made if relatively easy for me to navigate after the first hole.
Now, here's were the golf course on acid part happens. Although we had a map and it was pretty accurate, you can't really determine distance from it. There are parts of this course where you are, I kid you not, driving in the street. It may be for a small amount of time, but it gets confusing as hell and one of the holes (I think it was 9) only points you to the street and then never tells you where to turn off so after driving three or four blocks down a street and watching multiple cars pass me, I did what any sensible person would do in that situation and turned to my boyfriend and said, "You drive!" Yeah, I panicked a little. I would just appreciate a little better signage or for the map to at least clearly outline streets (with street names) that I should be taking to get to the next hole.
It's only April so the grass wasn't perfectly green, but the grass was nice for the most part. I am interested to see it towards the end of spring or in the summer, but it really wasn't bad for the time of year. There were quite a few aged trees which was nice to see and one of the water features was full which made for some great pictures. The smaller water feature was unfilled, but I think they might be working on it. They had a couple of water coolers on the course which was nice, but we still ended up heading up to the bar to grab a couple of soft drinks (they were complimentary because we were on the course which I thought was a really nice touch).
I thought the course looked very nice. It was a charming experience and I'm excited to head back out here again. We didn't have time to practice at the driving, chipping, or putting ranges beforehand because we went kind of late in the day, but I will make those the number one priority next time I'm out there. From what I saw of them while we were eating, they looked nice. It was very nice, but not snooty... I don't know that I could've had a better introduction to golf in El Paso than Horizon Golf Course. read more