This seems to have gone cold. It is Lilleshall Hall in Shropshire, a Harry Colt course. It was built not long before the Second World War and is a course of very distinctly different halves. The front nine is largely wide open, the back nine routed through thick forest.
The 1st used to have a line of cross-bunkers where most drives finished up and had to be played as an unsatisfactory lay-up.
The 2nd green is at a low point on the course and used to be surrounded by boggy ground making it something of an island green in wet weather.
Bunkering on the 3rd is plentiful, of little concern to the long hitter, but well placed for the higher handicapper.
You can't see the 4th tee on the aerial - it is buried in the trees. It was usually a matting tee, for grass didn't grow in the darkness of the tree canopy, and it was one of the hardest drives on the course, out over a series of ponds, but below the overhanging branches. A slight fade put the tee shot into the trees on the right, a slight pull left no shot to the green, closed out by trees and a pond on the left.
Another tough drive follows on the 5th, again out over a pond to a fairway leaning from left to right. It was easy to finish behind or in the trees on the left and quite difficult to hold the fairway on the right, the best place from which to approach the narrow ledge green.
A pleasant short hole over a stream, a fairly unmemorable short par 4 along the fence and a wholly unmemorable par 3 on the flat led to a good dog-leg 9th back to the clubhouse with OOB on the left. It was on the football pitches on the left that the 1966 England football team trained before going on to win the World Cup - we were too polite to interrupt them for autographs.
Over the road the scene changes and a nerve-wracking drive opens the back nine - it must be straight as a die. I think they may have opened up a ditch just in front of the green.
The 11th is a gorgeous hole, with just enough curve to call for correct position from the tee.
The 12th is a handsome long par 3, and the 13th curves deliciously as it climbs to a beautifully located, sloping green.
In my time there the 14th was lengthened. It had been a short, downhill par 4 (around 250 yards I think) and the temptation was there to drive the green, which sat just beyond a cross-bunker and close to the OOB hedge on the right. When they lengthened the hole it simply became a routine lay-up hole.
The 15th is a demanding, curving, climbing par 4 with a precise drive required to set up any sort of shot to a ledge green.
A short walk through the woods leads to the 16th tee, and a short hole played across low ground to a green set off in front of a pond. I recall this as having devilish borrows.
The 17th involves an uphill drive and we used to have to ensure that the drive finished to one side or the other of a mid-fairway elm. The short approach was made downhill to a front-to-back sloping green with a chasm beyond. It was one of the fun shots of the round.
Once again precision is called for off the 18th tee, the fairway curving just sufficiently that an inaccurate tee shot may well be blocked out by trees.
Not by any means a great course, but lots of fun and it is a very beautiful spot in an unspoiled corner of England. From a golfing point of view there's not much to attract the visitor to Shropshire, but if you happen to be passing through Lilleshall Hall is well worth the detour.