08-25-2005, 09:32 PM
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Sundazed marooned duffer
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Join Date: Mar 2004
Posts: 158
(10)
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Dye Fore Trip report (long post warning)
A few weeks ago my golfing buddy and I decided to get something for our Fedo-golf membership and play a round of golf on The Links at Casa de Campo. We played Dye Fore last year on the ‘free spin deal’ and since The Links was new to the Fedo-golf package this year and it’s been a while since we both played it, it was decided that it should be the course receiving our long straight drives, and never more than 2 putts on our 100% greens hit in regulation. 
We knew from the CdC website that Teeth of The Dog was being landscaped the entire off-season but what we didn’t know was that The Links was also closed for some maintenance for a short period. So when we showed up Dye Fore was the only thing available. No matter, it is the best course on CdC but we were eager to try The Links again. We’ll be back on The Links after it reopens on the 16th of August.
We both like to loosen up by hitting some practice balls before the round but there’s no driving range at Altos de Chavon where Dye Fore is located and hitting balls at the CdC driving range first then get in the car and drive up to AdC didn’t appeal to us. We decided to go cold turkey from the 1st tee.
A free round is a truth with some modification. The cart was still 20 USD (each of us!) and you don’t get away with 300 pesos/caddy as we do at Las Lagunas. Anyway the weather was nice; hot, but not too hot, there was a nice breeze all day.
We’re both 14 hcp, so we chose the white tee. While enjoying the view from the black, gold and blue tee we passed on the way to the whites, we knew we had no business back there. I birdied the 1st short par 5. That was stupid! It meant it could only go downhill from there. A par at the short par 4 2nd and on to the par 3 3rd. A pushed iron too many had me staring at a 60 foot birdie putt on a humongous green. I walked away with a 5 and hoped the view from the next two par 4 holes along the Chavon River would cheer me up. It did. Astounding view down the river to the river mouth and CdC marina and the million dollar villas being built along the fairways are not that bad to look at either. I pared and bogeyed my way through the short par 3 with a deep killer bunker in front of the green; the par 4 with a huge waste bunker full of guinea grass bushes down the right hand side; a dogleg par 5 with a blind 2nd shot and a par 4 to end the front 9. So I thought I had a chance to break 80 for the first time. Upon turning the scorecard I saw that the back 9 were considerably longer than the front 9. D’oh!
A quick stop to reduce water pressure at the turn and maybe a sandwich from the 19th hole bar. No sandwich, no snack, no candy, no fruit, just bevys. What a disappointment. They had a pool though…
I made par on the long par 5 10th. But then I didn’t see another par until the very short par 4 17th up the hill. The back 9 are even more spectacular than the front with 5 holes along the Chavon river. Looking back at Altos de Chavon hanging on and over the cliff side is truly awesome. Two long par 3’s (the 12th and 15th) right on the edge are just as spectacular as any seaside par 3 on ToTD. A long par 5 ends the journey. It’s a 2-tier fairway and it is WIDE . I don’t care how bad a golfer you are, that fairway will give you confidence before teeing off. It’s a sea of green, mainly because the paspallum grass used on this course is the most lush green I’ve seen on any course in the DR. And you can use saltwater to irrigate it. Genious.
After the round we thought of treating ourselves to a pizza from that place on the 2nd floor behind the church in AdC. It was closed. I never been to the marina and my friend knew of a good Italian food place with reasonable prices on the road just before you get to the marina itself. It was closed. The marina itself had plenty of boats, restaurants, shops but no people. It has sort of a Mediterranean feeling to it with the plaza and alleys. Very nice. We didn’t feel like paying 500 pesos for the same pizza we only pay 200 for in Sto Dgo though, but we needed a beer for sure and had a couple at one of the small “diner” places behind the central plaza while breaking down (and eventually ripping up) the score card. The service was slow at best and of course they didn’t have any change. Even if I owned one of the million dollar villas at CdC I would feel ripped off at 100 pesos/Presidente in a small place like the one where we had the obligatory post round beer. Maybe that’s why there were no people there… We left.
A quick stop for another beer at a reasonable price and a chat with Flemming at Playa Vista in Boca Chica ended the field trip before heading home to Sto Dgo. The afternoon rush hour traffic on the Americas highway is not part of a field trip, especially when you get to that ‘bridge to nowhere’ that was raised before the PanAm games and is already receiving padding because it’s crumbling.
We’ll be back next year and try to bring this monster to it’s knees (Dye Fore not Flemming) because paying 200 USD green fee is just too much for a round of golf no matter how spectacular the course. Okay we get the Fedogolf discount but still a lot of $$$, but that ‘free spin deal’ pays for itself with just this one round.
If you play golf in the DR the Fedogolf membership is a killer deal.
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