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Two Putts to Paradise
 Velvet fairways and perfect greens await |
Yet if there’s anyplace where it’s easy to shrug off a bogey, this is it. With close to 90 courses bathed in year-round sunshine and spectacular natural beauty, the Paradise Coast is a premier golfing destination. Merely choosing which courses to play is a monumental undertaking – albeit one with a guaranteed win-win outcome.
Guided by the ethereal golfing experience rather than specific designers or styles, we’ve selected four courses to play in four days, hoping to capture the essence of the area’s ever-evolving golfing landscape.
Wild horses…
Stock yourself with a cache of balls and enough adrenaline to pound a 300-yard drive and tee it up at Lely Mustang Golf Club, just down the cart path from the luxurious accommodations at GreenLinks Golf Resort. While Club Pro and Tournament Director Marc Canady can demonstrate how to skillfully maneuver across the rolling fairways and expansive greens, the less gifted golfer gets a first-hand look at many of the course’s 12 lakes and bottomless greenside bunkers.
The Lee Trevino-designed course’s imposing length – 7,217 yards from the back tees – can make it far more challenging than the traditional resort course. However, at just over 6,000 yards from the white tees, the well-manicured Mustang is also an enjoyable test of golf for those vacationers
 Fourth hole at TiburonJohn R. Johnson |
The Shark’s Bite
The next destination is Tiburón, The Ritz-Carlton Golf Resort, Naples’ course boasting velvet-smooth fairways that could pass for greens at most courses. This one-of-a-kind Greg Norman design, host of the annual Franklin Templeton Shootout, features virtually no rough. Instead, “The Shark” used crushed coquina shells and landscaped waste areas to create the ultimate exercise in “target golf,” rewarding good shots and showing little mercy on the swings you’d rather forget.
On the par five 9th hole, for example, one can hit a seemingly perfect approach over the lake toward the immaculate green only to have the ball land on the crest, pause momentarily and role tragically backwards into the murky abyss. Then, on the very next hole, the still-mourning golfer can watch his or her playing partner skip the ball a blasphemous five times across a pond and onto the green of the picturesque par 3 10th. Ah, how agony and ecstasy so intricately entwine at Tiburón.
Classic Vintage
Across town at Naples Beach Hotel & Golf Club, hazards are less pronounced, but the feeling of threading a drive through the towering oaks, pines, and tropical flora is equally satisfying. This classic Florida course, constructed in the 1920s, boasts a long and colorful history, hosting numerous professional and amateur championships.
The course evokes the feel of a tropical garden, with exotic screw pines, a flowering poinciana, and
 Tee it up at any one of 90 courses. |
Following yet another wayward tee shot and the ensuing “thwack,” it can be easy to curse Andrew for not removing more foliage, but the magnificent role the trees play framing the course outweighs the momentary frustration. Thick but fair rough and strategically placed hazards add to the delight – and peril – of the walker-friendly course, which finishes with a tough dogleg right to a peninsula green that dashes many a hope of breaking 80.
Birdies’ Eye View
Maintaining focus is no easy task at Marriott’s course, The Rookery at Marco. The sprawling wetlands that envelop the course – and swallow more than a few balls – make it tough to stop wildlife watching and concentrate on the game at hand. It comes as no surprise that The Rookery is a member of the Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary Program. On the 11th hole alone, a soaring osprey and lazy alligator frequently join the resident bald eagle in witnessing the embarrassing three-putt bogeys common to the oversized green. In truth, leaving the binoculars at home is as big a loss as missing another three-foot putt.
The beneficiary of a dramatic redesign by Robert Cupp, Jr., The Rookery’s five sets of tees, generous sloping fairways and large, undulating putting surfaces make it friendly to first-timers. But the deep bunkers and encroaching wetlands, not to mention championship tees that stretch to 7,180 yards, make the track both challenging and interesting enough to play over and over again.
Which leads to a final thought – with dozens of courses still to play and new ones popping up almost annually, it’s time to start booking some tee times.
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