A Pillow Fight in Africa
The bet is £10 a hole over 108 holes. The most one of us can lose is £1,080, but only if that person loses every single hole across 10 days. Given the state of my game since my first daughter was born, this feels entirely possible. Thankfully, my opponent has a child of his own. His swing has also been brutally ripped from his grasp by a small, demanding infant.
Luke Davies, MANORS co-founder, godfather to my first born, and perennial ****hole, has a smirk on his face.
He thinks he's won — Or at least he wants me to think he's won — Not falling for that — Shut up and focus on your tee shot —
After 107 holes of golf in balmy 28 degree tropical heat through the province of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, the match is tied. It might sound like a clash of titans, but in truth, it’s been a pillow fight. Each feathery blow, more pathetic than the last, as we’ve racked up scores in the high eighties, nineties, and dare I say it, the centurions.
But here, on the driveable 18th at Durban Country Club, we load our pillows with stones. I can’t think of a more beautiful and historic place for this final rumble in the jungle.
Luke and Alex were testing the new Summer Capsule from MANORS golf - Click Here to check out the collection.
A century ago, a strip of land north of Durban, overlooking the Indian Ocean, was handed to two Scottish course designers. They didn’t do much to it because they didn’t need to. Durban Country Club emerged from a wonderful plot of land in 1922 and barely changed in 100 years. That is, until its recent renovation under the stewardship of our fabulous hosts, the Jonsson family. Now, Durban Country Club sits proudly as the only African course in the world’s top 100, and it looks perfectly at home there.
The fairways heave and tilt like the sea they sit beside. The wild bush crowds the perfect sloping greens. And much like the Scottish links that inspired it, a stiff wind often decides what club you’ll hit long before you can. Durban Country Club is unquestionably Africa’s finest test of golf. It’s also one of the most difficult starts in the world.
The first five holes are treacherous, with out of bounds right, coastal bush left, narrow fairways, elevated tees, and a wind that arrives without warning off the Indian Ocean. The first is a long par four that swings left around a dune to an elevated green. The second tee is the highest point on the course. A small, elevated green, ocean to your right, no shelter to be found, and an incredible view of Durban City. Then the famous third. A par five down a dune valley so tight it feels like the bush is leaning in to watch me duff it down the fairway.
After five of the hardest opening holes in golf, I was battered and bruised. I’d carried a lead of 12 holes into this match from our previous rounds, but Luke had been chipping away at my score. Or more accurately, I’d been blasting my lead out of bounds at any chance. What you learn quickly at Durban is that the course does not reward power, not that I typically aim to overpower a course. Most of the round, the driver stays in the bag. It is a thinking course. Pick your line, hit the fairway, accept that par is a fantastic score and move on.
Or, in my case, ignore all of the above.
The middle stretch eases off slightly. The land flattens, the bush thins, and the course leaves the dunes for a quieter, parkland-like section before circling back toward the sea and elevations. It is a clever routing. The breathing room after a brutal opening lets your round build and reset, before testing you again. You walk these holes thinking the worst is behind you. And it is, technically. But the course asks constant questions. The greens are so undulating you need the knowledge and technique to actually hit your spots. I aimed for the middle and hoped.
The 12th, known as the Prince of Wales, is the kind of hole that can go unnoticed if you play it well, or can haunt you for days after. It is a short par three, no more than a flick with a wedge, but the green is a perched tabletop that falls away sharply on either side. Miss left or right and you can ping-pong back and forth five times before you have a putt. A bit like the second at Royal Dornoch.
The name comes from one of golf’s great cautionary tales. The future Edward VIII played here in the 1920s and ran up a 17 during his first round. The following day, presumably having had a quiet word with himself, he came back and made a three. The club, in the way only golf clubs can, decided both performances deserved commemorating. They named the hole after him, and now host the Prince of Wales Cup, an eclectic tournament where members stitch their best score on each hole across two rounds into one wonderfully fictional card.
Incredibly, we both made par, but alas, by the 16th, my lead was gone entirely.
Standing on 17 tee I was one down and fearing I’d blown a huge lead. The green here sits at roughly the same elevation as the tee, but between them lies a fairway of huge peaks and troughs, widely regarded as some of the most dramatic fairway contours in the world. The sensible play is an iron. Find the high ground, leave yourself a view. I pulled driver in a moment of madness. I caught the bush out of the corner of my eye, panicked, and sent a horrible slice spinning right toward a pair of white posts.
My caddie shot off after it down one of the huge slopes. He returned with such an enormous grin that I seriously considered whether he might have lobbed my ball back in from the bushes. But there it was, sitting directly on the line. I didn’t ask. I grinned back.
I couldn’t see the green over the rise, but undeterred, I fired a 7 iron 170 yards almost vertically skyward, the slope working like a ramp beneath it. The ball climbed, hung, then came down and slammed into the green like a meteor.
I’d tied the match again heading to 18.
The home hole at Durban is one of the great half-pars in world golf. A drivable par four of around 250 yards that’s often compared to the 18th at the Old Course, due to its very own Valley of Sin. From the members’ tee, a 3 iron or hybrid leaves you a decent chance of hitting the green or finding the Valley of Sin. Both of us hit good ones but walking over the crest, I could see one ball sitting pretty on an upslope short of the green and the other on a downslope. I was the downsloper.
I mustered a decent chip and left myself a ten-foot uphill putt for birdie. Burnt the edge. My boss, my best man, that overweight bastard Luke, rolled his in.
I still haven’t paid him the £10.