Mar 1, 2005
By Thom
"Too heavy for your swing," Togomah clucked when I reached for the 8 iron. "You'll overshoot. Try the 9 instead."
My buddies and I were standing at a par 3 on the rolling hills of the famous White Witch golf course at The Ritz-Carlton Golf & Spa Resort in Jamaica. We had come for a casual weekend getaway of sticks, but were happy to find ourselves with seriously improving games. Mine was due in no small part to my caddie, "T" for short.
Our caddies?a requirement at the resort?weren't the traditional sort. These guys knew what they were doing. They knew the lay of the course, the slope of the greens and even the nuances of the offshore breezes. And after playing a round with us the day after we arrived, the caddies knew us and all our weaknesses.
White Witch Golf Director Kenn Depew says it isn't necessarily what the caddies?golf concierges as they are known?do, it's how they do it. "The concierge provides traditional caddie services as well as other requests with a level of service far above a standard caddie. They make the round more enjoyable with the genuine care and comfort of our guests as their highest mission."
My mission was to lose as many strokes as possible in my game and so far it was working. I stared down the beautiful green that dropped over 100 feet to the hole. Named after Angela Palmer, a local who offed three husbands before her 29th birthday, the White Witch is a stunning 18-hole course, designed by Robert von Hagge. It is one of three courses on the property, and has an almost magical Xbox appearance, a kind of beauty that earlier in the day had inspired one of our crew, Mike, to murmur, "This is like playing Pebble Beach without paying the $400." Mike, I noted, was lugging around a Pebble Beach bag.
What makes the Ritz-Carlton such a golfer's paradise isn't just the mix of both the stunning appeal of the course and the caddie's intimate knowledge of the layout and quirks of the land. It is the resort, too.
The 427-room AAA Five Diamond Hotel, only 15 minutes from the Donald Sangster International Airport, is a vacationers Shangri-la on the country's beautiful northern coast. Surrounded by 5,000 acres of picture-perfect estate gardens, the resort is a perfect luxury getaway. My room, a 480-square-foot Ocean View suite, boasted a view almost as good as the White Witch. And when the sun went down, I could look forward to easy sleeping in a king-sized feather bed jacketed in Frette linens.
In classic Ritz style, the resort also hosts a number of top-end restaurants including Jasmines?the signature eatery that specializes in serving "Jamasian" cuisine, a blend of local ingredients cooked with Asian techniques, all accompanied by some light jazz. For the more romantic, there was Horizon's, an open-air restaurant on the Terrace, while Mango's provides the casual pool-side atmosphere complete with cheeseburgers and jerk chicken. Try the jerk chicken quesadilla!
While the golfing is world class at the Ritz, there are plenty of other attractions for non-golfers. The resort has a variety of non-motorized watersports down at the beach house, ranging from snorkeling to sailing. Farther afield are other natural attractions like the famous Blue Lagoon and the terraced cascades of the Dunn's River Falls and Park.
Snorkeling, waterfalls and feather beds, though, were far from my mind back up at the White Witch. Did T really know his stuff? I could play it safe and stick with the 8, or I could trust my caddie. I dutifully switched clubs. I swung and felt the snap of the ball. We all watched as it arced out and seemed to come down almost on top of the hole. I would one-putt for a birdie.
"I told you," T smiled as he shouldered the bag. Small surprise, I mused as we hopped in the cart and headed down, that Cond? Nast Traveler magazine had just named the Ritz as "the top golf resort in the Caribbean and Atlantic."
Our caddies?a requirement at the resort?weren't the traditional sort. These guys knew what they were doing. They knew the lay of the course, the slope of the greens and even the nuances of the offshore breezes. And after playing a round with us the day after we arrived, the caddies knew us and all our weaknesses.
White Witch Golf Director Kenn Depew says it isn't necessarily what the caddies?golf concierges as they are known?do, it's how they do it. "The concierge provides traditional caddie services as well as other requests with a level of service far above a standard caddie. They make the round more enjoyable with the genuine care and comfort of our guests as their highest mission."
My mission was to lose as many strokes as possible in my game and so far it was working. I stared down the beautiful green that dropped over 100 feet to the hole. Named after Angela Palmer, a local who offed three husbands before her 29th birthday, the White Witch is a stunning 18-hole course, designed by Robert von Hagge. It is one of three courses on the property, and has an almost magical Xbox appearance, a kind of beauty that earlier in the day had inspired one of our crew, Mike, to murmur, "This is like playing Pebble Beach without paying the $400." Mike, I noted, was lugging around a Pebble Beach bag.
What makes the Ritz-Carlton such a golfer's paradise isn't just the mix of both the stunning appeal of the course and the caddie's intimate knowledge of the layout and quirks of the land. It is the resort, too.
The 427-room AAA Five Diamond Hotel, only 15 minutes from the Donald Sangster International Airport, is a vacationers Shangri-la on the country's beautiful northern coast. Surrounded by 5,000 acres of picture-perfect estate gardens, the resort is a perfect luxury getaway. My room, a 480-square-foot Ocean View suite, boasted a view almost as good as the White Witch. And when the sun went down, I could look forward to easy sleeping in a king-sized feather bed jacketed in Frette linens.
In classic Ritz style, the resort also hosts a number of top-end restaurants including Jasmines?the signature eatery that specializes in serving "Jamasian" cuisine, a blend of local ingredients cooked with Asian techniques, all accompanied by some light jazz. For the more romantic, there was Horizon's, an open-air restaurant on the Terrace, while Mango's provides the casual pool-side atmosphere complete with cheeseburgers and jerk chicken. Try the jerk chicken quesadilla!
While the golfing is world class at the Ritz, there are plenty of other attractions for non-golfers. The resort has a variety of non-motorized watersports down at the beach house, ranging from snorkeling to sailing. Farther afield are other natural attractions like the famous Blue Lagoon and the terraced cascades of the Dunn's River Falls and Park.
Snorkeling, waterfalls and feather beds, though, were far from my mind back up at the White Witch. Did T really know his stuff? I could play it safe and stick with the 8, or I could trust my caddie. I dutifully switched clubs. I swung and felt the snap of the ball. We all watched as it arced out and seemed to come down almost on top of the hole. I would one-putt for a birdie.
"I told you," T smiled as he shouldered the bag. Small surprise, I mused as we hopped in the cart and headed down, that Cond? Nast Traveler magazine had just named the Ritz as "the top golf resort in the Caribbean and Atlantic."