Training Log Archive: chitownclark

Harborside Int'l GC - Port Course. My golfing partner dislikes this place; says it is too expensive, too difficult, and built on fifty years of Chicago's garbage. All true. But I wanted to try playing here myself, so I waited until Larry was out of town and took the Metra Electric down to the Pullman neighborhood and walked east to the landfill.

Quite a ritzy course. They don't plan for people walking here. I had to shimmy under a chain-link fence going and coming to avoid a round-about route for cars. And despite paying for the mandatory golf cart, I hoisted my bag and walked the very long course inside of four hours.

What a day...winds were constant up there with no trees to block anything. Even putting was difficult: ball would head promisingly toward hole, then a blast of wind would send it spinning down to the fringe. My 12 degree driver was the wrong club: my high arching drives would get swept away by the wind into thick, lush, green roughs, where they were impossible to find, let alone hit back to the fairway.