13th hole, Bandon Preserve, Oregon, USA

Par: 3

Architect: Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw 

Back tee*: 109 yards / 100 metres

Joe Average tee*: 109 yards / 100 metres

Green fee: $50 Nov. 25-Jan. 31

How she looks

*Distances taken from club website

No, you have not misread the yardage.

Shortness does not automatically preclude greatness. Nor does the fact that your principal reaction upon visiting the teeing area is, "What the hell is this...?!"

The latter, in fact, may well be a prelude to greatness. Any golf hole that spits in the face of convention and expectation, is at least off to a good start.

Such is the final hole (yes, even the hole count is unconventional) at Bandon Preserve.

One sentence in the course notes made me opt for the 13th over the 9th*. 'A bump and run or putt down the left side will funnel onto the green'.

I'm struggling to imagine anything that demolishes the paradigm quite like inviting the use of a putter for your tee shot.

Sure, professionals would eat this hole alive and even for you and me, it probably needs the wind dancing around the place to come into its own. 

But then this blog isn't aimed at professionals and according to those in the know, wind is precisely what Bandon gets, more often than not. Topping out at a frisky 30 mph, no less.

So let's say you get the gusts and everyone in your four-ball goes for the conventional pitch shot. Everyone save one maverick who, amid widespread ridicule, opts for a Texas wedge. And winds up 15 feet closer to the hole than anyone else.

Confounding norms and reminding everyone that the phrase 'more than one way to skin a cat' applies more to golf than maybe any other game. 

On a hole you'll all recall with a smile for years afterwards.

This isn't the Best Picture Oscar, where earnestness prevails over comedy. This is Cheap Golf's Greatest Holes, where just being great fun is sometimes enough to qualify.

* I was really close to choosing the 9th hole here, because it's so beautifully balanced. With the breathtaking backdrop comes an exposed part of the site that throws the hole wide open to the elements. Yet despite this, the safety/calamity equilibrium is nicely maintained by a generous putting surface. You might feel challenged on the tee in a howling gale, but you don't feel doomed.

7th hole, McCall Lake Golf Course, Calgary, Canada

Par: 4
Architect: Renovated by Wade Horrocks in 2019 
Back tee*: 376 yards / 345 metres
Joe Average tee*: 301 yards / 275 metres
Green fee: CDN$45 twilight rate
How she looks
*Distances taken from club website or, if unavailable there, from Swingu

Any golf architect looking for meaningful feedback on a hole he's created could do a lot worse than to install a GoPro camera behind the tee and film golfers' body language as they tee off.

If they ponder what's in front of them before addressing the ball, you succeeded. If they swing away on autopilot, you failed.

And that's what I like about the 7th at McCall Lake. All the options stop you in your tracks.

For brevity's sake, let's take one of them out of the equation and assume there isn't a stiff breeze ripping across that hefty body of open water (or, even worse, towards it).

The boomers among you can toy with the idea of going for the green from one of the forward tees but laying up isn't without its choices.

The short line on the left involves flirting with the water, while staying right brings two bunkers into play. 

If you like your chances of avoiding both water and sand and landing your drive beyond the traps, you'll pretty much take the water out of play for your approach but your drive must now negotiate a much narrower landing area.

Meanwhile, the ultra-conservatives can land their tee shots short of the bunkers on the right but there's now nowhere to hide with a tricky approach shot. And if you over-compensate in your anxiety to avoid the lake, there's a bunker awaiting you behind the green.

Even the greenkeeper has momentous choices to make. You'll notice that this becomes a very different hole when the pin is on the narrow left side of the green rather than the broader right.

Yes, there's a lot going on here. And I love it.