Roller Coaster Round at Tamarina Golf & Beach Club, Mauritius
Greetings,
Today we’re going to discuss the final round of golf that I had the real pleasure of playing while visiting Mauritius not long ago. The course in question is part of the Tamarina Golf, Spa & Beach Club located in Tamarin, Mauritius. This course was a challenge to say the least and it had some incredibly scenic views as you’ll see while you scroll through the photos below. Solid spot and for a while I had the best round of my life going before the largest par 3 blowup I’ve ever experienced in recent memory. Then again, that’s golf right?!
Everything started out great for me and for the first several holes it was all pars with the odd bogey, not bad?!
On the 4th hole I hit a terrible tee shot that barely cleared the women’s tees but somehow parred the hole after a solid 3 wood before missing the green with a wedge only to chip it in from the fringe. The next hole I got an easy bogey and was feeling on fire. That’s when things got crazy at the first par 3 above. This hole was about 171 yards or so and based on the wind wasn’t sure if I should hit a 6 or a 5 iron. I opted for the 5, hit it poorly and found myself deep in one of the gruesome greenside bunkers. Everything fell apart and I left with a 9 on the scorecard; that’s right a 9!
As it happens the rest of the 9 went rather well and each of the other players had their own respective issues. There are houses that line some of the fairways and they just look out of this world; super peaceful with lush vegetation surrounding them and the mountains in the background. Before long we were on the back 9; the 11th hole is called Snake Eyes and off the tee there is a a real risk/reward decision that awaits.
Handicaps aside and especially after the blowup we decided to just make a friendly competition out of things. My new Mauritian friend somehow convinced me that going for risky play good idea and lost another stroke. Basically it’s a spit in the fairway and if you smash your drive through the short side which is tight and suicidal, you might be able to make the green in two. Seriously, it’s a losing proposition statistically for most as I found out the hard way but was almost lucky.
Not much later there was another par three which is pictured below. The photo doesn’t do it justice as it’s captured in odd late day light light shrouded in shadows. It was just easy on the eyes and also really hard to gauge what club to use. This course was really open for the most part but disaster could strike at anytime especially if you found yourself hitting an errant shot at an inopportune time.
As it happens we never got to finish the 18 as it was getting late and we had a plane to catch. I will note though that the 18th is an incredible hole with some serious elevation change. If you connect your drive on the screws and send it down the fairway you’ll clear this ridge and then your ball will roll forever turning a rather reasonable par four into a driver, wedge and hopefully a solitary putt. Aside from that the clubhouse facilities were great and if you’re eating; I recommend the burger…
It was great times playing this golf course from holes 1-16 and of course resuming for the all important 19th…
In closing, this #MyMauritius blog trip was created and managed by the fine people at iambassador and AHRIM in association with the Mauritius Tourism Promotion Authority and Air Mauritius. I’d like to thank them for the invitation to partake in this campaign; I had an incredible time.
