When you come to Maui on your next golf vacation, go ahead and leave your golf clubs at home, but don’t forget your camera.
Because while the golf on Hawaii’s second largest island is spectacular, the dramatic setting is even more so. While you can rent golf clubs, and even golf shoes, at almost all the island’s best courses and resorts, you don’t want to come away from this “Magic Isle” without a camera full of postcard-quality photos.
Nearly everywhere you turn, from beaches (white, black, and red sand) voted among the world’s best to the island’s highest peak (10,230-foot Haleakala) with its unforgettable sunrise, there are photo ops.
But some of the best views are found on Maui’s golf courses. There are more than a dozen courses that you can play year round, including five of the island’s best at the Kapalua Resort and the Wailea Golf Club.
Kapalua, on Maui’s northwest shore, stretches from the mountain peaks to the ocean. Their Arnold Palmer-designed Bay course offers plenty of breathtaking views, perhaps none better than at the signature par-3 5th hole. Here you’ll need to drive over Oneloa Bay to a small green. No small feat considering the urge to just stand there and take in the view.
The resort’s second 18 is none other than the Plantation course. The Ben Crenshaw/Bill Coore design will seem very familiar. Its sweeping ocean views are featured each year in the PGA Tour’s season-opening tournament.
On the southside of Maui, the Wailea Golf Club and its three award-winning courses form one of the island’s premier resort destinations. From the classic layout of Old Blue to the carpet-like fairways of the Emerald, Wailea’s courses are fun to play and are among the world’s most women-friendly, in addition to being captivatingly beautiful.
The gem of Wailea, though, is the Gold course. Home to The Champions Skins Game for much of the last decade, this thinking-players course is as challenging as it is beautiful. In fact, they say its most difficult hazards are the distracting views.
Maui’s golf courses run from the muni to the magnificent, from the slopes of volcanos to stunning sand beaches. For a complete listing, plus plenty of helpful travel information, visit MauiGolfCoast.com or call 800-525-6284.
