I find it curious that of the two courses at Mount Edgecombe, GolfRSA rates The Lakes (132 slope) easier than The Woods (134) off the white tees. I would have thought the other way round. The Lakes does have some wide fairways but there’s intimidating tee shots to be faced between 8 and 16 which makes this a compelling layout for the stronger golfer. The long par-4 ninth is similar to the famous 18th at TPC Sawgrass (home of The Players Championship) with the Pani Dam edging the left side of the hole from tee to green. And opposite is the 14th with water right of the fairway. Before that the downhill 13th is narrow. The dogleg par-5 15th is an improved hole after a multi-million-rand project to build a wide gabion channel to replace part of the stream which crosses from the right-hand side of the fairway to the left, feeding a dam behind the green. No more flooding and the reeds left of the green have disappeared, giving a cleaner look to the complex.
