[Thomas Dai]

Currently watching on TV a joint South African-European tour event from Leopard Creek in South Africa's Kruger National Park and wondering what have been some of the most arduous construction projects folks posting herein have been involved with or have heard of? Ongoing maintenance aspects too.


Not so much the design, money, permissions, permits etc side of the business, more the physical construction aspects caused by the sites location, the travel, the accommodation, the machinery or the terrain or the climate or the native dangerous critters large or small (or even politically motivated!) on the site?


Anecdotes would be nice!


atb

[John Emerson]

That place takes the cake as far as animals go...”hey roger look at that giraffe/lion/hyena trotting across the 16th fairway”

[Ira Fishman]

http://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/how-golf-architects-solve-the-problems-of-difficult-sites

Ira

[David_Tepper]

Thomas D. -

Clint Eastwood's Tehama course in Carmel Valley, CA has to be high on this list. I don't know the details and I have only played there once (which is enough ). 

The course is built on a very sloping property, across multiple ravines/barrancas. I have never seen so many retaining walls and bridges on a golf course.

Rumor has it Nicklaus passed on designing the course as he did not think he could build a good one on that property.

DT

[Thomas Dai]

http://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/how-golf-architects-solve-the-problems-of-difficult-sites
Ira

Thanks for highlighting this Ira. Some interesting stories here.
Atb

[Ian Andrew]

The Problem Bear at Muskoka Bay

My final project with Carrick Design was called Muskoka Bay. The golf course was carved out of 250 acres of bush and rock with the golf course is strung out over 11 kilometers. The surveyor laid in centerlines for the holes by clearing a 5 wide meter opening from tee to green. This brought the first bear sighting of the project – from a distance.

The next stage was for Doug and myself to go out and flag out the trees for removal and the trees to be preserved. The tree cutters established paths between holes for access and once again the bear was sighted – on one of the paths. The cutters dropped the trees that were flagged out and the Skidder team followed them in picking up the trees and taking them to the burn piles. After a while the bear found the tree cutters coolers and enjoyed a nice meal.

The cutters then tied their coolers in the trees. After a while our frustrated and brazen bear approached the cutters looking for food. Initially they would light up firecrackers to scare the bear away – usually quite effective - but after a few weeks it would not even turn after a firecracker was let off. We now had a problem bear.

The bear took to looking through the parking area for food after finding a meal one day and this caused chaos. When one of the workers was followed right into his truck – everyone became scared – even the tree clearing crew that were used to bears. We all walked in and out of the site from the same location and using the same trails and it unnerved all of us. At this point one of the site supervisors had enough and took to carrying a shotgun to scare the bear away from the cutters.

He wasn’t the only one to carry a gun on the site in the end. The skidder team and cutters worked closer together since the bear didn’t like the skidders – food or no food. The concern became the individuals walking the trails or the site. Our role throughout was to go out into the areas - to be cleared - where only the centre lines were cut so we could flag the full clearing widths along with all the key trees to keep. For perspective – this was thick bush – we yelled back and forth to see where each of us was using a flash of orange jackets for a quick location. With the bear clearly unafraid of humans, the supervisor thought we needed to carry a gun for our safety.

Doug was reluctant and chose to stick with his large can of Pepper Spray. I had one too but always thought that once the bear was close enough to effectively use the pepper spray – it was more likely he would be scared of by the smell from you shitting your pants – than the pepper spray.

The joke on the site was it was better to walk in pairs with someone you could outrun - or if you were the slow one, the trick was to trip the other guy first and then run away.

Anyway, I carried a shotgun with me for nearly a year – particularly during the times that I was out there by myself - which was most often the case. There was nothing more upsetting and nerve-racking than the couple of times that I could clearly smell the bear nearby – kind of like extremely foul breath. It was most nervous I have ever been – safety off the gun – and hearing false noises everywhere. Imagine your heart beating 100 beats a minute no reception on your phone or walkie talkie because of the deep ravines of the site. I was left wondering why I chose this line of work.

It would be a perfect ending to say I’m writing this in front of the fire with my feet out on my bear skin rug, but the truth is someone else ended up having to kill the bear as it began to venture into town looking for easy food too.

[Mark_F]

Sanctuary Lakes in Melbourne.  An old salt works full of rock.  Apparently Bob Harrison's words on seeing the site for the first time were "Oh, shit".

[Adam Lawrence]

http://www.golfcoursearchitecture.net/content/how-golf-architects-solve-the-problems-of-difficult-sites
Ira

Thanks for highlighting this Ira. Some interesting stories here.
Atb

Not one of my better pieces. Some good stuff, but no flow.

[Thomas Dai]

Great story Ian.
I had an ‘interesting’ close-up experience with a bear once. Fortunately the bear decided some nearby trash cans were more interesting than me (smart bear!) and wondered off towards them. Phew!
Atb

[Dave McCollum]

Stone Eagle.

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