On Sunday I was hoping to keep my afternoon free so I picked a course about a half hour away from my parents house. For the most part I’ve been impressed with the courses up near Ocala but still have a decent number of places to check out. So, insert the Country Club of Silver Springs Shores, which is on the southeast side of town.

I booked my time online and was supposed to join a twosome. However, that twosome hadn’t checked in when it was time for our round (about 10am) so the starter had me head out on my own. Things were busy thanks to frosty conditions earlier, but I made it around in about three and a half hours. Thankfully the sun warmed everything up nicely and it was the warmest of the three Christmas weekend days!

Earlier this month a local I golfed with suggested a round at Silver Springs Shores. I figured I’d give it a try and for the budget green fee I paid ($20) there wasn’t much on the line. Ultimately, I liked a couple things about the course but probably not enough to offset the negatives elements about it.

First, what I enjoyed about Silver Springs Shores was the front nine and the all the beautiful green complexes throughout the course. The green complexes are framed by trees and popped in the sunlight! The front nine sits on the south side of the clubhouse in a wooded area. It isn’t long (3,123 yards from the blue tees) and has a quasi-parkland look to it. The front nine is highlighted by the 3rd and the 7th holes.

The 3rd is a wacky par-4 that doglegs almost ninety degrees right around a lake. It is 373 yards but the bigger hitters could probably carry it all the way to the green. For everyone else it will be a tough approach after a layup that cannot go right. The 7th has a crazy green that slopes severely from back to front. My putt ran 20 feet off the green after I missed a short par putt, doh.

On the other hand, I didn’t care for the back nine – except the island green par-3 13th, which was fun to play. The back nine is longer, tougher and filled with funky doglegs. The 14th, 15th, 17th and 18th all dogleg at odd angles which made it tough to pick the correct lines from the tee. The back felt forced into the condos and just didn’t fit with the front nine.

I played the blue tees which are 72.5/128/6539 and although Silver Springs Shores was designed in 1969, it felt quite modern. I’m sure back in the day the course was ahead of its time! The greens are heavily contoured (too much for my tastes) and mounding/bunkers narrow the driving areas and guard the greens. I found Silver Springs Shores surprisingly difficult. Desmond Muirhead designed the course and by my count this was the second course of his I’ve played.

Like the design the conditions were mixed. Hopefully the course can get an infusion of cash to spruce everything up because the facilities are dated. The greens were a bright green color – overseeded with ryegrass I believe – and rolled at a medium pace. Unfortunately, the fairways were disappointing. The ball always seemed to sit down in the patchy bermuda and it was tough to cleanly contact the ball. The tees and bunkers were decent.

Silver Springs Shores is a course with a plenty of funk, especially on the back nine. If the back nine played more like the front nine and the fairways were better conditioned then I would have enjoyed the round quite a bit more. For $20 I was happy to add another course to my list, but I wouldn’t go too far out of your way to play here.

Course Pictures (click any picture to scroll through the gallery):