I played it two years ago and was a referee at the Dutch Open two weeks ago. A few observations:
- the quality of the playing surfaces is outstanding, but they were on the soft side for the tournament as a result of significant amounts of rain just before the event. When I played there two years ago the greens were much firmer and some holes locations were tough to get to from certain angles.
- the course clearly needs to mature another 5 - 10 years as the heather is virtually non-existent and the native areas are mostly just fine to play from, so generally there is little penalty for missing the fairways, but given that one could end up in footprints etc. for which no relief is available one can get unlucky.
- the greens provide areas that are hard to reach from the wrong angle (in some parts of the fairways you can hardly see anything of the green)
- around the greens one should not short side oneself as this will provide a stern test of one's short game.
- for two days of the tournament, I was stationed at the parallel holes 9, 1 and 18 with connecting fairways around drive distance I could see that many players teeing off 18 and 9 preferred the first fairway; playing away from water and OOB and on the first quite a few ended up on the 18th fairway. Very few of those ending up on a different fairway were really hindered by it. Some probably preferred the angle to the green that they had to get to.
- talking to players many of them were really impressed by both the quality and the shots required to score well.
Comparing it to other recent expensive developments like The Dutch and The International, both of which I have played and officiated at in Dutch Opens, Bernardus for me is the best one looking at surroundings, consistency in the quality of the holes and the shaping that has been done on these properties. Although, I must admit that if the idea was to achieve a heathland like course at Bernardus, the way the water comes into play does not fit with other traditional heathland courses I know. On the other hand, there is plenty of natural water in the area, so water of itself is not far fetched.
In conclusion, I think it is a course worth playing especially once it matures over the coming decade. We should be pleased that someone is willing to put up the money to build and maintain such a course in The Netherlands.