Rural Golf Reigns Supreme

Stony Lake — I’ve played golf ever since I can remember. I grew up playing with my brother and my dad. We played rural golf. Quiet courses. Slow rounds. Even after we moved away, every summer, whenever we were all home, we would all go out together. This time, I went out with my dad and my son. He’s 4. It was his first time out. He can’t do much yet, but I gave him a 5 iron and let him go to town. He shot 27 on the first hole, 31 on the second. Not too bad. 

We made our way through the course at a snail’s pace on a warm September morning. We couldn’t have done that at a big busy course. There’s no time for a 4-year-old and a 5 iron when the course is packed to the gills. But we could do it at a rural course, like Benona Shores.

When many people think of golf, they think of crowded courses and well-known clubs. Scrambling to get a tee time on a Tuesday. Getting stuck between two obnoxious foursomes. Always having someone breathing down your neck as you tee off.

Doubts creep during practice swings, as onlookers light cigars and make small talk about the new kitchen renovations their wives have decided to do. “God, don’t let me slice. I always slice. This stupid driver. I can’t lose this ball in the woods in front of these people.”

How do you play well when you are constantly on edge? How do you enjoy your round when the tee box is like a train station? Rapid arrivals and hurried departures. I don’t know. The truth is, it doesn’t have to be like this.

Rural golf isn’t about clamoring to get on the most popular course. It’s not about obsessing over the most expensive gear. It’s not fancy. It’s relaxed. It’s wonderful. You can slow down and play multiple balls. No one is coming up behind you. Walking out of the clubhouse, you aren’t sure if anyone else is on the course. It might just be you. Eventually, you hear the faint sound of a tee-off in the distance. I guess someone else is here after all.

Golf should slow us down. It should force us out of the technological matrix and give us time to catch our breath in a vulgar and chaotic world that extracts more and more of our attention every day. The emails never stop. It feels like we can never get away until we leave our offices and our cars, our houses and apartments, and set out for the course.

Standing in the middle of the rich green fairway, the low sun slicing through the branches, the sounds of birds singing over head. We can stop here. Stand in front of our ball and just be quiet. Wait to analyze the next shot. Delay the practice swing. Don’t think about the lie. Just stop.

The warm light in the woods. A squirrel rustling in the undergrowth. Breathe in and out. Pausing for a brief moment, we are exposed in the middle of this perfectly manicured patch of grass cut from the forest. No music screeching from an iPhone speaker. No sounds of commerce or traffic. It’s a striking scene. In our exposure, we are alone. We are only known to the sky and the trees. Only the birds are a witness. Solitary, still, alone.

And then, a moment later, we can focus our determined eyes downward at our Titleist, shift our weight back and forth from foot to foot, wiggle our iron a bit, take the approach shot, and continue onward.

We can’t do any of this when the course is packed. It’s all too tense. When was the last time you had the freedom to wait alone in the middle of the fairway, just staring and listening? Unconcerned about holding anyone up, because there is no one to hold up?

One of my favorite rural courses is Benona Shores Golf Course, just north of Stony Lake in Oceana County. You’ve probably never heard of Benona Shores. You’ve probably never heard of Oceana County, either. Both are hidden secrets. I probably shouldn’t be talking about them. Benona (as we locals call it) is a short course. Par 60. It’s tucked away on Scenic Drive, a couple thousand feet from Lake Michigan. The closest town is Shelby, population 2,000. Surrounded by beautiful farm land and quiet roads. Golfing at Benona is the polar opposite of golfing in the suburbs. You can walk 18 for $24 and never have a problem getting a tee time.

Benona is rural golf incarnate. It’s hilly and wooded. The front 9 in particular feels like you are playing in a forest. Each fairway feels solitary. Tall trees and thick woods give you privacy on each hole. Originally, the land was a fruit farm. There are still fruit trees all around the course. Behind greens, next to fairways. They harvest the apples and pears every year.

Oceana County is farming country. Corn, asparagus, apples. It’s only fitting that Benona feels part forest, part farm, part fairway. Surrounded on all sides, even the course is farmed to an extent. There are a few apple trees right next to the 6th green. I hit right into them. My ball lays among a few fallen apples, 15 feet from the fringe. I nudge a few out of my way, as I crouch for my shot. Pitching wedge and then two-putt. When you are playing slow on a rural course, a bogey doesn’t hurt so bad. It’s more about the experience and the tradition and less about the scorecard. 

Rural golf is golf stripped of all the unnecessary corruption that often comes with crowded courses, trendy signaling, and over-commercialization. It’s closer to how golf was at its creation. In 16th-century Scotland, there wasn’t Ping or Callaway. There was, however, the sea and the breeze. The land and the game. Rural golf is its direct descendent in spirit and action. It’s inward looking and reflective. Natural and honest. Unpolluted. Undiluted.

O.W. Root is a writer based in Northern Michigan, with a focus on nature, food, style, and culture. Follow him on X @NecktieSalvage.