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The two newest private golf clubs in Rhode Island, Carnegie Abbey and Shelter Harbor, are at a cultural disadvantage to their older counterparts. Prestige can’t be imposed; it arrives at its own pace.
But that hasn’t stopped The Carnegie Abbey Club, founded in 2000, from trying to accelerate the process. This private “sporting club” on the shores of Narragansett Bay in Portsmouth is impeccably manicured and self-reverential. Part playground, part high-end real estate development—with cottages bearing names such as Royal Dornach [sic] and condominium apartments in a twenty-two-story luxury tower now under construction—its members share a privileged, Scottish-themed enclave.
The golf course at Carnegie Abbey is an open, links-style design by Englishman Donald Steel that wanders over rolling farm fields, some of them marked by original stone walls. The back nine offers spectacular views of the water, culminating at the drivable par-four eighteenth, where after hitting their drives players must walk along a beach to reach the fairway.
By comparison, four-year-old Shelter Harbor Golf Club, located in Charlestown a few wedges from Long Island Sound, is just a golf club. Michael Hurdzan and Dana Fry crafted a challenging parkland eighteen (as well as a fine nine-hole par-three layout) that looks like its been nestled in place between huge rock outcroppings for ages. With nearly a hundred feet of elevation change, the main course makes for a vigorous walk. But its fairways are generous and its putting surfaces large. Local rules charitably allow for a free drop when errant approaches die in the eighteenth-century cemetery to the right of the second green. Except for a pair of visitors’ cottages, the club’s four hundred acres are barred from sprouting houses. There’s no lack of luxury enticements, though: Inside the clubhouse, a neo-traditional Rhode Island shingle manor, members can eat stylishly or casually, work out in the fitness center, relax with a massage, and store their own wine. Tradition, though, they’ll have to wait for.
125 Cory’s Lane, Portsmouth. Architect: Donald Steel, 2000. Yardage: 6,675. Par: 71. Slope: 134.
One Golf Club Drive, Charlestown. Architects: Michael Hurdzan and Dana Fry, 2004. Yardage: 7,006. Par: 71. Slope: 131.
Copyright © 2008, American Express Publishing. All rights reserved.
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