It’s been a busy year at two newly re-opened golf courses in Kananaskis Country, with both tee sheets fully booked all summer.
And golfers are enjoying what they’re seeing.
“I think probably the most rewarding thing is just seeing the love and joy and appreciation of Albertans and golfers having this place back open,” said general manager Darren Robinson.
This is the first full summer both the Mount Lorette and Mount Kidd golf courses have been open since the devastating flood in 2013.
The Kananaskis River that runs through the properties swelled and tore a strip through the holes located in the valley bottom.
Head golf professional Bob Paley spent the years that followed taking on all kinds of jobs to help get the courses playable again.
“I miss being in a front-end loader,” Paley said with a smile.
“I would say it’s just been so amazing, we all talk about the fact that we had no idea whether this was coming back or not and so that old adage, ‘you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone’ is so true and so every day is a blessing for us.”
On Monday the courses hosted the first Kananaskis Couples Golf Classic, billed as a fun event for couples of all ages.
“We wanted everyone to come out here and just have a blast, take all the stigma of golf out and just make it fun,” said event manager Tracy Paley.
“There’s no handicaps, you don’t have to be an elite golfer, we just want golf to be for everybody.”
One of the goals of the restoration was to make the course more forgiving and inclusive to golfers of all skill levels while keeping up a respectable pace of play, and Robinson says that’s what they did.
“Our target goal is four-and-a-half hours and pre-flood, we used to hit that 75 per cent of the time,” said Robinson.
“We hit that probably 98 per cent of the time now.”
