Ten years ago, Bridport, on the north-east coast of Tasmania, was little more than a sleepy fishing village. It was about this time that the biggest landowner in the area, businessman turned potato farmer Richard Sattler, signed off on building a golf course on his beachside property, just east of town.
The spectacular par-3 15th beneath the new restaurant and spa.
When the Tom Doak and Mike Clayton-designed Barnbougle Dunes officially opened for play in 2004 there had already been hundreds of rounds played on the course. “They’ve been playing out there for months,” I recall theBridport bakery shop assistant telling me during my first visit for the opening. “We’ve had Americans and Brits here already and they’ve come all this way to play the course.
“It must be pretty good,” she added.
Indeed Barnbougle Dunes is that good and remains one of this country’s best layouts. Now it has a new neighbour – Barnbougle Lost Farm – and for those, including myself, who have already had the privilege of playing the layout, it has the potential to be considered an even better course.
At this point it must be said that the two courses are different in many ways and comparing one with the other is difficult. Where Barnbougle Dunes offers one visually spectacular hole after another, the Bill Coore-designed Lost Farm combines the spectacular with holes that place the highest possible value on good strategy from tee-to-green.
Coore’s aim was to make Lost Farm a different golfing experience to Barnbougle Dunes and he has succeeded on every level.
“People are always asking if this course will be better than the Dunes course and there’s no way it could be,” Coore told Golf Australia earlier this year.
“They are different. You can’t believe how different the land is for two courses so geographically close to each other. What we have hopefully done is build a course which complements the first course, that’s what we’ve tried to achieve.
“If some people prefer Lost Farm and others prefer Barnbougle Dunes then that means both must have something right.”