Herald should have consulted others

I was amused by The Herald’s top picks of golf courses in the state, published in the Sports section July 13.

There is no way Harbour Pointe deserves to be in the top 10 or even the top 20. Perhaps a better way to rate courses for an article like this would be to take opinion polls from actual golfers, not just so-called experts who are pampered throughout their rounds.

There is more to a course than how nice the views are; they should be rated on the overall experience of the course, the food, the attitude of the counter people, the speed of play and the helpfulness of the marshals. All of these things affect how a player feels when he (or she) plays a course.

And, what happened to Kayak Point golf course? It used to be ranked as one of the top 50 courses in the country and now it doesn’t even make the top 20 in our state. And, as for Lake Padden, yes it’s affordable, but there are so many other courses that deserve a higher ranking – Like Eaglemont, Shuksan, Dungeness, Moses Point, Sudden Valley or Port Ludlow, to name a few.

I believe that you need an unbiased way to rate these courses that is more fair. Otherwise, people will play the ones that are in the paper and have bad experiences, or even worse, they will miss out on all the great courses in our state that are deserving of our patronage.

Calvin Burlingame

Darrington