America’s Top 10 Munis
The chief requirement for making this list is that the golf course must be owned by a municipality. We’re judging here on the quality of the design, test of golf, scenic appeal, and tournament lore. For best-value munis? We’ll leave that for another time. Here then are the 10 best municipal courses in the U.S. […]
12 of Golf’s Scariest Watery Graves
Whether you call them water hazards or penalty areas, golf’s lakes, rivers, streams, and oceans often become final resting places for our errant shots. You can recover from deep rough or a bunker. But there’s no coming back from a water hazard unless it’s a very shallow one and you’re feeling especially courageous. Here’s a […]
Pete Dye’s 9 Scariest Holes
Tiger Woods once asked me, “Has anybody ever built harder courses than Pete Dye?” I replied, “Nobody has ever built courses that are more visually intimidating than Pete Dye.” Tiger shot back, “Exactly.” Indeed, Dye himself stated, “My overall philosophy is to make the hole appear more difficult than it really is.” In reality, Pete […]
10 Great 18-hole Courses on Fewer Than 100 Acres
In January 1930, just 14 weeks after the Wall Street crash and the catastrophic collapse of the U.S. stock market, course architect Alister MacKenzie set sail from Hoboken, N.J., bound for Buenos Aires. During a roughly eight-week stay in South America, the Scotsman designed, or suggested improvements to, at least six courses in Argentina (including […]
The Most Resonating Courses in Golf
Some golf courses have a unique and unmistakable sense of place. The ancient Romans had an expression: genius loci, or sense of place. Their belief was that every city and town had its own spiritual identity, the way it was experienced, imagined, yearned for, and held in the heart and soul. Now, 3,000 years later, […]
10 of Golf’s Most Dramatic Cliffside Courses
When you think of the elements that create drama on a golf course routing, two of the first that jump to mind are probably “on the water” and “significant elevation change.” So, it’s small surprise that cliffside golf holes elicit such interest and fascination. Some courses fully embrace their cliffside location, putting the perched prominence […]
The 7 Best Alister MacKenzie Courses You Can Play
Whether it’s early April when the Masters rolls around at Augusta National or any time of year when somebody posts a jealousy-inducing tweet about their round at Cypress Point, the topic of Alister MacKenzie’s genius is front and center. Having said that, only the fortunate few can swing a tee time at Augusta or Cypress. […]
Golf’s Most Intimidating Courses
No course intimidates so thoroughly as Pine Valley Legendary scribe Bernard Darwin called Pine Valley “an examination in golf.” It’s been called far worse. Perennially ranked as the world’s best golf course, it is also likely the most intimidating, certainly for a middle handicap golfer. Its bunkers sport sinister names such as “Hell’s Half-acre” at […]
A Golf & Whiskey Tour of Ireland
Few things are more revered in Ireland than its golf and its whiskey. Visitors to the Emerald Isle should take advantage of the opportunity to experience this match made in heaven by combining whiskey distillery tours with visits to the best nearby courses. (I recommend that you schedule your distillery visits for after you’ve played your […]
10 of Golf’s Top Single-Course Destinations
Mike Keiser is famous for saying one course is a curiosity, but two makes a destination. It’s hard to argue that assertion, as typically the most-celebrated golf destinations have multiple courses—from Pebble Beach, Pinehurst, Kohler, Kiawah, and Streamsong to the super-successful golf getaways Keiser himself has built, like Bandon Dunes and Sand Valley. That said, […]
