ROSE HALL, St James — There is optimism after last Thursday’s reopening of the White Witch golf course in Rose Hall, St James, after being closed for almost three years due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The course, nestled between two other world-class facilities — the Cinnamon Hills and Half Moon courses — is expected to enhance Jamaica’s reputation for being a golfing destination, even as the tourism industry seeks to rebound.

The property has been described as “a proper golf course” by Keith Stein, director of golf, Rose Hall Golf (Cinnamon Hill Golf course and White Witch Golf course).

Michele Rollins, chairperson of the Rose Hall Developments Limited, owners of the course, and Rick Burrowes, president of Rose Hall Developments Ltd, were also excited by the reopening of the course that was first opened in 2000.

“We were down for almost three years and basically everything had to be redone, the club house had to be repainted, new furniture, new shop, new greens, everything,” Rollins told the Jamaica Observer after taking the ceremonial first tee shot on Thursday.

She added: “Almost three years is a really long time, but we kept it in decent, basic conditions, but there were still a lot of work to do.”

“This area is so unique with the Cinnamon Hills, White Witch and Half Moon courses, right beside each other, where can you find three courses where you can come and spend five or six days and play a different course each day,” said Rollins.

Her ceremonial swing, she said, was the first time she had held a club in years, and when asked how it felt, she responded: “It felt fabulous!”

Stein lamented that the closure of the almost 7,000 yards, par 71, 18-hole course “for almost 1,000 days” had coincided with Jamaica falling behind her regional neighbours as a golf destination for tourists.

“When we opened up in the 2000 we were top five in the Caribbean and Mexico. We are still in the top 30; it’s a fantastic golf course. We did have to close on March 28, 2020, and I did send an e-mail to the team last night that we have been closed for almost 1,000 days. I did say jokingly I was three years younger when we closed the property,” he noted.

Stein was full of praise for the staff.

“Clive Anderson is our grounds manager and he did a fantastic job bringing this back; we had a short window and our pro shop manager Patrina Gordon and her team [have] been really fantastic,” he said.

The timing of the reopening, Stein said, could not have been better as “tourism in Jamaica is changing”.

“It [tourism] is on an up beat, so I think this is a good time for us, [as] over the last three years during the pandemic, a lot of the other Caribbean countries, particularly the Dominican Republic and Mexico, they did COVID a little differently, regarding travel, than Jamaica did, so we kinda got left behind a little bit,” Stein reasoned.

The next step, he said, was to make sure the “word gets out” that the White Witch course is back in business.

“Our marketing team will be getting together with the Jamaica Tourist Board and the hotels and we just have to get the word out. When you say you are closed, you get left behind very quickly, so we got to get out and get back on a cycle where we get tourists here,” he said.

Burrowes agreed that the timing was key.

“You have no idea how excited we all are; it’s been a long time coming. I think it speaks volumes to the rebound of tourism in Montego Bay, and Jamaica, so today is a really fabulous day,” he said.

While not getting into specifics about the cost of the refurbishing, Burrowes said the course cost “in the hundreds of thousands of US dollars, just for the grass surface alone”.

— Paul Reid