Royal Zoute

Michael Jackson’s Billie Jean was pumping, the crowd was excited, and I stood on the tee feeling all eyes on me.

Well, I am exaggerating slightly.

On our way to the Solheim Cup, where dancing was de rigueur on the first tee, we played lovely Royal Zoute.

The 12th tee is just yards from a school where parents and children were enjoying a garden party.

I doubt they noticed my disappointing, loopy drive or my pleasing recovery that led to a tap-in par, but the moment was memorable because it broke the tranquillity of the course in the upmarket seaside resort of Knokke-Heist.

Royal Zoute has great pedigree. Harry Colt transformed the original 1899 seaside layout into a strategic masterpiece.

Extensively damaged during both World Wars, it was restored by Lieutenant Colonel Allen (whose first name remains a mystery), who also built the very popular, shorter Executive course.

The club is rightly proud of its Royal status, granted by King Albert I of Belgium in 1925, and has hosted several professional tournaments, with winners including Lee Westwood (twice), Darren Clarke, and Miguel Ángel Jiménez.

Meanwhile, Mackenzie & Ebert have recently overseen bunker upgrades, green surround enhancements, and dune restorations.

Ah, those bunkers. I can vouch for their quality because they are many and varied, and my ball found a lot of them.

The Royal Zoute clubhouse and welcome are high-end. The team in the well-equipped pro shop loved to chat, as did the starter in a smart hut next to the first tee. Tees are gender-based, and he recommended the whites for me—raising the eyebrows of a long-standing member. It turned out to be a fair choice.

We had been delayed at the Channel Tunnel, so we didn’t have time for much practice, which proved regrettable on the early holes. The course demands accuracy in all departments, and it takes a while to sync into its angles.

Consequently, I started indifferently, despite driving down the middle on the opener between trees on the left and undulating rough on the right under the gaze of a group of members. My second found a greenside bunker, and my putt came up short as I hadn’t considered the soaking from a morning downpour.

My first par came on the short third, where the ball must be guided between sand traps surrounding a green that falls back to front.

Grassy hillocks restrict views of the fairway on the fourth and the par-five fifth, which doglegs left. After a decent drive, I paid for being too greedy with my approach when the fairway contours pushed the ball into tangly rough.

The sixth is stroke-index one—a par-four with a small landing area nestled between natural dunes. Trees, bunkers, and slopes protect a green sited next to a house featuring a sculpture of a reclining naked lady.

This must have given me the perk-up I needed because my game was suddenly transformed, starting with a crisp iron into the seventh and a narrowly missed birdie putt.

The eighth is a corking long par-three surrounded by gorse hedges and sand traps; it takes an impressive effort to come away unscathed.

Meanwhile, the ninth presents the most fearsome drive on the course, requiring a long carry over duneland before an intimidating approach over and between bunkers.

I will now make a bold claim: the halfway hut at Royal Zoute is the best I've encountered on my travels. Not only is it beautifully arranged, but the apple and mint juice had rejuvenating powers, and the homemade bread and butter pudding was delicious. It would have had my dear old dad salivating.

It had the desired effect as I attempted to come back from two holes down against Mrs W. The 10th is a lovely dogleg with a fairway hidden between dunes. Its green sits between traps, but its subtleties were no problem for my opponent, who drained her putt from around 20 feet.

However, she dropped two holes after the cunning par-three 11th and the aforementioned 12th, which weaves between pines and silver birches.

The white tee on the 475-yard 13th had the biggest length differential, requiring a carry over a dune on the left to a fairway that bends toward a subtly contoured green with, surprisingly, no bunkers.

Mrs W was desperately unlucky to find the right-hand spectacle bunker in front of the green on the gorgeous par-three 16th. The hole plays through woodland to a putting surface falling back to front, with a steep drop-off left and a large trap right.

Her misery was complete when she faded her ball into a bush on the handsome home hole—a par-four with out-of-bounds down the left.

I played my best drive of the day there and followed it with an approach to the heart of a tiered green. Sadly, I missed the putt but the win was secured.

More disappointingly, we didn’t have time to enjoy a drink on the gorgeous clubhouse veranda. But that leaves a scratch to be itched next time at Royal Zoute.