Golfing at an Old Hudson’s Bay Outpost

We’ve been golfing the last two days at Lake of the Sand Hills Golf Course at Buffalo Point on Lake of the Woods with our friends Rudy and Sue. The scenery on many of holes is spectacular.I was interested to learn that the golf course is located on the site of an old Hudson’s Bay trading outpost where the local Ojibwa traded their furs for guns, traps, cloth and beads.

David Thompson the famous Canadian explorer and mapmaker charted the area on a map in 1825. Par-pe-qua-wungar-Sakahagan, the Ojibwa name for the south basin of the present Lake of the Woods is clearly marked on the map. The translation of the Ojibwa designation is Lake of the Sand Hills explaining why the golf course bears that name. The name comes from the fact that there were extensive deposits of sand around the lake.Inside the Lake of the Sand Hills club house where we had a nice lunch

the history of the First Nations people who lived in the area is catalogued in series of photosand even the tiles on the walls tell the natural history of the area.

Lake of the Woods and the birch and pine forest provide a stunning backdrop for the course.

We golfed on Thursday and spent the night at my brother and sister-in-law’s cottage at nearby Moose Lake where we had a steak barbecue and taught our friends how to play the card game euchre. Our Friday round of golf was near perfect. No wind, no mosquitoes, no rain, temperature not too cold and not too hot, and we had the course to ourselves. We did not encounter any other golfers our whole round. Golfing at the site of a former Hudsons Bay trading outpost was a great experience. I look forward to golfing there again.