ON THE TEE WITH DALE

Dale Leatherman is a freelance travel writer specializing in golf, adventure, and the Caribbean. Her writing career includes four years as a newspaper features editor, 12 years as a magazine features editor, and eight years as a website editor. She has been a full-time freelancer for more than 20 years, with articles appearing in publications such as The Robb Report, Caribbean Travel & Life, Diversion, Meetings & Conventions, LINKS, Executive Traveler, Golf for Women, Continental, and LINKS. Her work also includes special advertising sections for Travel & Leisure Golf, Travel & Leisure, Attache, Sky, and the Los Angeles Times. Dale is editorial director of Caribbean Escapes. E-mail DALeatherman@cs.com for reprints or rewrites for publication.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Before I had a chance to visit the Abaco Club, the golf writers who beat me there were all a-twitter about the latest “golf and sporting retreat” created by British entrepreneur Peter de Savary. Superlatives were flowing so freely that I suspected they had succumbed to the tongue-loosening Bahama Mamas, a potent rum concoction the islands are famous for.

I was skeptical because many new developments seem oblivious to the natural rhythms of an island and its people, marching instead to the beat of foreign drums.

And I had never set foot on a true “tropical links” course. I doubted I ever would.

The Great Abaco I knew—the largest in a 120-mile stretch of mostly uninhabited islands--was a laid-back paradise with uncommon natural beauty and a simple way of life. Somehow it had remained immune to the frenetic pace of Miami, which is only a 45-minute flight away.

The Abacos were a place where I could explore dirt roads in an open Jeep, with frequent breaks to snorkel in isolated coves. Or stalk bonefish in crystal clear shallows without ever seeing another fisherman. I remember one idyllic afternoon of scuba diving when we beached our boat on an uninhabited island and cooked lobsters we’d caught over an open fire. I also remember when I first saw the small band of endangered wild horses who have lived on Great Abaco since their ancestors arrived with invading Spanish conquistadors centuries ago.

I arrived at the Abaco Club the way members and prospective members do—on the club’s 12-seat private jet. I barely had time to View from one of the Abaco Club cottages. Copyright Donnelle Oxley.

View from one of the Abaco Club cottages. Copyright Donnelle Oxley.

finish my Bahama Mama before we were landing at the club’s private terminal at the Marsh Harbour Airport. We passed through customs and immigration without breaking stride, then relaxed in the well-appointed air-conditioned lounge while our bags were dealt with. Across the tarmac, I knew that the tiny Marsh Harbour terminal building would be teeming with perspiring passengers. The government has promised a $10 million airport expansion, which can’t come too soon!

Twenty minutes later our Range Rover was pulling into the unassuming entrance to the Abaco Club and traveling along a sand road bordered with flowering bougainvillea. Flowering shrubs also hid our cabana from view, and a simple wooden walkway led to the door.

The rustic exterior did not prepare me for the octagonal room that lay inside. It was simple, elegant, spacious and comfortable. Uh-oh, I was starting to think in superlatives. Award-winning designer Nicole Langlois had used lots of cool white, with art and accents in the bold colors Bahamians favor—turquoise, pink, blue and lavender—and natural wood for the ceiling and floor. The air-conditioning was soundless, even before I turned on the Bose surround-sound music system. On one wall was a large plasma screen television, easily seen from the bed (dressed with Italian linens) and the sitting area. Running along another wall was a marble-topped wet bar with Villeroy and Boch china, and a stocked refrigerator. Our bags were inside a big walk-in closet so there was no need to clutter our living space. A door on the far side of the room led to a well-appointed bath with stylish sinks and fittings. Flowing white drapes concealed French doors opening onto a screened deck with a thatched roof, hammocks and cushy chairs.

Abaco Club No. 4 green. Copyright Donnelle Oxley

Tres chic! Oh dear, I was thinking in French. I don’t speak French, not more than a dozen or so words.

The hammocks were tempting, but we had exploring to do. Our personal electric golf cart sat just outside, plugged into an unobtrusive charger.

The club occupies a private 520-acre peninsula with two miles of pink sand beach overlooked by bluffs. Club members are building homes atop the cliffs. Nine of the 60 lots are still available, priced at $1.6 million to $3.9 million. I fell in love with the turnkey, two- and three-bedroom cottages with decks fronting on Winding Bay. Starting at $2.3 million, they are luxuriously decorated and furnished in Langlois’ understated island style. Twenty-nine of the 75 cottages have been completed and sold.

You don’t have to own a home to be a club member; just pay an $85,000 fee and annual dues of $6,000. Cabanas like ours rent for $950 a day in peak season, $650 off season, including breakfast and dinner.

The cottages occupy the same ridge as the clubhouse—a stylish, relaxed setting for drinks and dinner. Doors open onto a pool deck that is a prime spot for sunset viewing. A similar wood building houses a spa with treatment rooms, an exercise area, a sauna and a steam room.

We stopped at the marina, the launching point for boating excursions for deep-sea fishing, bone-fishing, scuba, snorkeling or island-hopping. Then we fed apples to the sleek Quarter Horses at the stable and hastened to our own lunch at Buster’s, the open-air bar on the beach.

I struck up a conversation with Archie, the bartender. Sipping a cold Kalik, the Bahamian beer, I realized that every employee we’d met had been as friendly as Archie. And all were delighted with the jobs the Abaco Club provides the islanders--construction workers, Abaco Club Hole 17. Copyrigth Donnelle Oxley.

Abaco Club Hole 17. Copyrigth Donnelle Oxley.

fishermen and farmers, as well as maintenance and service workers.

Across the sand road from Buster’s lies a small golf shop. Our clubs were there, ready for action. It was time for us to find out what happens when you turn a couple of Scottish golf course architects (Donald Steel and Tom Mackenzie) loose on a deserted peninsula in the Bahamas. Oh, and give them a budget with lots of zeros and all the earth-moving equipment they need to amuse themselves among the dunes.

Heather and gorse were lacking, but bougainvillea and oleander provided touches of color. Instead of the roiling gray ocean and lowering sky, every hole had a view of azure sea under a sunny canopy of blue. But the wind gusted with a vigor worthy of the British Isles, whipping flagsticks and wreaking havoc with ball flights. Bump-and-run is the skill to have here.

The terrain was pure links—hard and fast, with fairways heaving along over salt-sprayed dunes bound by unforgiving rough. Deep bunkers guarded vast greens whose humps, bumps and swales needed no protection. Nothing was decorative or extraneous; all was in play. The only modern touch was the paspalum grass, a salt-resistant, fine-bladed variety that is the hot ticket in the Caribbean and southern U.S.

Every hole on the 7,123-yard layout was different, and so many were notable that the idea of a signature hole is laughable. The first fourteen holes are quintessential links, and the final four return home atop a bluff with stirring views of the sea. Many holes linger in the mind: four through seven are so close to the sea you can hear the sirens’ call. Nine is brutal to the point of unfairness in the way its mounds toss everything into an area where the elevated green is not visible. Holes 15 and 16 flirt with a massive quarry. Seventeen is a beautiful, windswept par 3 with the Atlantic along one side (ala the seventh at Pebble Beach). But 18 is my favorite. The par 5 drops Abaco Club Hole 18. Copyright Donnelle Oxley

Abaco Club Hole 18. Copyright Donnelle Oxley

visible. The clubhouse overlooks the finishing hole.

De Savary—his friends call him PDS—was not at the club, but we ran across his yacht in Marsh Harbour. Rogue. I knew it had to belong to the British gent with the rogue-ish smile who had paid his dues selling encyclopedias, apprenticing in woodworking shops and oil fields, and struggling to build an import/export business in Africa. Along the way he acquired an appreciation for historic and natural treasures, and a love of gardening and landscaping. Resurrecting properties like Skibo Castle and Bovey Castle and creating places like Carnegie Abbey and the Abaco Club is fun for him. It took him five years to find the Abaco Club site and an equal number to finish the paperwork and start construction. Resort communities like these are for the moneyed, to be sure, but the wealth spreads to entire communities, even islands.

PDS wasn’t on board. Too bad. I wanted to thank him for what he’s done for Great Abaco. No doubt I would utter more than a few superlatives.