Texas Outside Golf Course Review
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Harbor Lakes
Texas Outside Rating: 8.5
18 Holes - Golf - Public
Granbury, TX
817-578-8600
Website
Online Tee Times Online Specials

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Date Played: September 21, 2007
Front Nine Rating: 8.5 Stars
Back Nine Rating: 9.0 Stars
Approximate Weekend Price Range: $39.00 to $70.00
Where To Get Coupons: GolfQ.com, Entertainment Passbook

Brief Description:
Harbor Lakes was voted Best New Course in Texas in 2003 and it is well deserving of that accolade. Harbor Lakes is a links style course that from the tips will challenge the best golfers and from the other three tee boxes will provide a fun, challenging, and memorable experience. The course has been in very good condition on the three occasions that we have played it. The fairways and rough are well manicured and the greens are above average size, undulating, and in very near perfect condition.

Harbor Lakes will present you with a variety of challenges - water on 13 holes, strategically placed bunkers, berms, dog legs, and natural grass hazards. The course demands excellent club selection and good course management if you want to score well.

A new club house was opened in 2004 and it has an excellent 19th hole for relaxing and reminiscing about your round, excellent food, and a very good club house. The staff is very friendly and helpful and wants to make sure you have a fun and enjoyable round. There are coupons available that make this course an excellent value. You should go out of your way to play this course. Find a B&B in Granbury and enjoy a couple rounds and make it a fun weekend.

 
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Texas Outside Scorecard for Harbor Lakes
Beauty:  
Difficulty:  
Variety:  
Fun Scale:  
Value:  
Condition:  
Other Good Information:

Beware of water on 13 holes and the 45 sand traps.
Condition of the greens is 9.5 and the green difficulty is 7.5 out of 10.
The 19th hole is excellent and the clubhouse food is excellent.
The pro shop is excellent
Walkable: Yes
GPS: No
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Course Yardage, Slope, and Rating:

Tee Box Yardage Rating Slope Par
Gold 7,230 73.5 136 72
Blue 6,862 72.1 132 72
White 6,216 69.7 124 72
Red 5,373 70.7 112 72

 

Here's How Texas Outside Determines the Scorecard Rating

The Texas Outside rating scale ranges from 1 to 10 – a perfect 10 course would be something like this:  links along a cliff overlooking the Pacific ocean and bordered by tall trees; lush fairways on rolling hills with lots of natural hazards; water (which is crystal clear) on most of the holes; immaculate greens (but they are undulating and tough); lots of variety and character (each hole is completely different and includes blind shots, elevation changes, doglegs, and significant challenges); perfectly manicured traps with the whitest and prettiest sand you’ve ever seen; a nice club house with great food and a 19th hole; a GPS; plenty of beverage carts or your own cooler and ice; and it only costs $40 bucks! What this means is that you probably won’t find any 10s in Texas – try Cabo San Lucas, Pebble Beach, or some of the Hawaii courses! 
Texas Outside rates courses on the following:

  • Beauty – tall trees, rolling hills, beautiful houses, waterfalls, and similar stuff would score high; a 1 would be flat, bushes or cactus instead of trees, and some grass but mostly weeds
  • Difficulty – a straight, 300 yard par 4 with no traps or hazards, no out of bounds or water would probably get a 1; if it is a 460 yard par 4 over two ravines, with water along one side, natural hazards on the other, strategically placed traps or that dreaded tree right in the middle of the fairway, we are talking a 10. 
  • Variety – what would you give a course where all the holes looked and played exactly the same (“I thought we just played that hole!”); were side-by-side, which is good for finding or dodging other people’s balls, but not much fun; and you can see the flag from every tee box?  That’s right, it gets a 1.
  • Fun Scale – a 10 is where you walk off the course and say “now that was fun” and you can’t wait to get back, or you immediately turn around and play another 18 holes
  • Value – a 5 is $50 to $60, a 10 is $20 to $30, and 1 is $200 or so – of course all of this is dependent upon how you liked the course.  For example, if a run down, boring municipal course, with six players on each hole was only $10; it would still get a value rating of 1.
  • Condition – this one’s pretty easy – what condition are the fairways. A 10 commands very lush perfectly manicured fairways, compared to a 1, which has fire ants, weeds, and more dirt than grass!
  • Condition of Greens and Difficulty – very hard to read greens with lots of undulation and tough pin placement, rate very high on the difficulty scale.  Condition is self-explanatory.  

All of the above determines the overall score for the golf course.  In other words, we like courses that are pretty, fun, very challenging with a lot of variety, and fairways and greens in excellent condition – all for $40.  We also tend to play the courses that are affordable for the masses, which means in the $30 to $80 range. We rate hard and we haven’t found a 10 in Texas yet – don’t worry we haven’t given up and we’re still looking. 

 

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