The Zone Interactive Golf Magazine (UK) The Zone Issue 25 | Page 41

GOLF TRAVEL
“How far to the pin Pete?” “It’s 137 yards from the marker Bernhard.” “Is that from the front of the marker or the back?” Okay, so that story about Bernhard Langer seeking distance advice from his caddie, Pete Coleman, might be an urban myth, but it summed up everything about the German – meticulous in his planning and his preparation, leaving nothing to chance. And much the same could be said of his homeland. All right, I am willing to admit that it may not be the most obvious place to visit for a golf break, but it took my breath away on a recent trip to the north of the country, starting in Hamburg and finishing up on the fabulous Baltic Coast. The quality of the hotels did not come as a surprise, but the standard of the golf courses most certainly did. More of that later. First of all, some impressions and observations of the country, or at least the parts I saw. If you have a soul then you must have dreamed of getting your car out on the autobahn and flooring it. If you are not used to driving at speeds of around 140-150mph then my advice to you is: don’t do it! The Germans are brilliant drivers, but they are used to cruising at such speed and, here’s the thing, you will not see any lane hoggers. Not one.
THEZONE / ISSUE 25

They overtake and then move back to the inside lane. Roadworks? Pah! Yes, there were some dotted here and there, but they didn’t cause traffic to back up because local drivers obey the rules. When the signs tell them to travel at 120kph, that’s what they do; when they are told to slow down to 100kph, they do that too. And if everybody follows the rules, by the time the limit has come down to 50 or 60kph, everybody is already travelling at that speed, so there is no need for everybody to suddenly slam their feet on the brake pedal. If you are going to hire a car, make sure it has GPS (don’t worry, it will do), and the efficiency of the Germans means that when you climb behind the wheel and set it up for your first destination, it will be in English. But that is just about the only English you will hear so it would make sense to learn some basic German if you are considering a golf trip to this part of the world. I arrived at Hamburg Airport courtesy of an easyJet flight that took little over one hour from Luton, followed by a five-minute walk to collect my Avis rental car. Just stop and think about that for a minute. It takes at least twice as long to get to Spain or Portugal and then you have the Spanish and Portuguese traffic to negotiate when you have landed. During a week in which I drove more than 800km, I
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