Set on 150 acres just outside Port Hope, Ash Brook Golf Club is pure 'country golf' - wide skies, roomy fairways, and not a house in sight. It's the kind of place where the stress drops a club length the moment you step on the first tee. The par-72 layout is friendly to newcomers but has enough movement and green-side nuance to keep single-digits interested.
Early holes let you settle the swing, then the routing starts to ask for shape and trajectory. Misses aren't automatic penalties, but premium angles absolutely pay off - especially into multi-tiered greens where a smart leave can turn a two-putt into a tap-in. Wind can be a quiet character here, too; on certain days you'll feel it tugging at club choice and ball flight just enough to make you think.
A differentiator is the setting itself: despite being minutes from Highway 401, the course feels removed from everything - no back-yard windows, no construction noise, just golf. Couple that with a genuinely welcoming staff and a pace-of-play culture that keeps things moving, and you've got the recipe for a repeatable, happy round.
If you're plotting a casual day trip east of the GTA or you live nearby and want a reliable 'go-to' that the whole foursome will enjoy, Ash Brook is a safe bet. Bring a putter that starts on line and you'll be grinning by the time you reach the car.
My buddy Tim called golf “the expensive sport” last summer. He said it while buying his third $14 beer at an NFL game. I let it go – mostly because he was paying for mine too – but the comment stuck with me. Was he right?
I didn’t think so. But I wanted to prove it with actual numbers.
So I dug in. National Golf Foundation reports, concert ticket data, NFL cost analyses, streaming price histories. The full picture. And what came back surprised even me – golf isn’t just holding its own against other entertainment options. In a
