I'm on my second stint as a Floridian. My first took me from Leesburg to St. Petersburg to Inverness, working at newspapers and discovering new golf courses at every turn. After a period up north, I'm back in the northeast corner of the Sunshine State. TPC Sawgrass is my home course, one of so many great places we're blessed to have as Florida golfers. Let's explore some of the others together.
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Golf QUESTIONS
Q: I want to take a Florida golf vacation with my family at a resort in the winter months. Will it be warm enough to play?
Absolutely. There can be a chill in the air early in the day, especially in the northern part of the state from Sandestin to Amelia Island to St. Augustine, and you’ll even get the occasional brief frost delay, but by lunchtime, it’s what I call “pants golf,” quite comfortable.
The farther south you go, of course, it’ll pick up a few degrees. The resorts will be waiting for you and ready to show their finest.
On the southwest coast, in Naples, just north of the Ten Thousand Islands and the Everglades, you have a can’t-miss selection. The Naples Beach Hotel and Golf Club is renowned, as is the Ritz-Carlton Golf resort. The La Playa Beach Resort and the Lely Resort are also terrific golf resorts.
On the other side of the coast, Doral is always a sure bet, with its five great courses, including the PGA Tour-tested Blue Monster and the Great White, one of the most scenic in Florida.
Turnberry Isle Miami is an excellent choice, as is the Bonaventure Country Club in Fort Lauderdale. If you have time, check out Crandon, the municipal course on Key Biscayne. It’s a very good layout with scenic views of the Miami skyline.
Q: We are staying winters in Florida. Is there a golf card for reduced prices on courses?
Most of the Florida golf cards, as you might expect, are for the summer. However, you do have options. Paradise Golf has a winter program that allows unlimited play from November to April at 30 courses in the Tampa Bay and central Florida area at the “guaranteed lowest rates available. There are other benefits as well. Go to www.paradise-golf.com.
PCM has a winter premier card for South Florida courses in which you get a 10 to 20 percent discount off the “lowest applicable rate” from Nov. 16 through mid-April. There are some excellent courses participating. Go to www.pcmgolf.com for more info. The Sandestin resort in northwest Florida has snowbird golf programs at reduced rates.
Also, you might want to simply check out your favorite courses to see if they offer winter specials.
Q: My family and I are traveling to Florida, and my husband and three boys would like to golf in the Orlando area. We are on a limited budget. Do you have any suggestions on where to go for a great family course at reasonable rates?
There are a number of value courses in and around Orlando. Before I get to those, also be aware that rates can change throughout the day. For example, good deals can be had on twilight rates and, if you like to walk, you’ll save on cart fees.
Here are some excellent value courses in the area, some of them as good as the higher-end tracks. Some are in Orlando and some are in nearby towns, short drives from Orlando. Just click on the link for more information: Fairways Country Club; Highlands Reserve – one of my favorites – Forest Lake Golf Club, Rock Springs Ridge, Cleveland Heights, Bartow Golf Course, Diamondback Golf Club, Kings Ridge South, Kissimmee Bay Country Club and Lake Orlando.
Q: Can you please tell me what is classified as peak and low season?
Peak golf season in Florida for the vast majority of courses is January through March, the winter months. That’s when most tourists visit the state, when it is still warm compared to the rest of the country. Winter days are almost always warm enough to get in 18 holes. A “secondary” peak season is October and November.
The low season is usually from the end of May through early or mid-September.
Q: I am relatively new to the game. I would like to go somewhere in Florida for two to three days that has golf courses for a high handicapper and of course nice weather in mid-February.
There are many, many places that fit your needs.
How about northwest Florida? The Nicklaus course at the Bay Point Marriott in Panama City used to be one of the toughest courses in the state. Renovated by Nicklaus Design, now the course has wide, sweeping fairways and the greens have wide collars and bail-out areas.
Or Kelly Plantation in Destin. They recently added another set of forward tees to a course that was already very playable. It has great views of Choctawhatchee Bay and it's always immaculately groomed, for easy lies. If you don't like forced carries, don't play Kelly Plantation from the back tees. Play it from the forward tees, which take the forced carries out of play.
In northeast Florida, you could easily spend two-to-three days on playable courses, like the Golf Club of Amelia Island. The course is relatively short and the greens are fairly small, but flat with no tricky slope or undulation. Amelia River is another excellent, affordable course.
Or the Ponte Vedra Inn and Club, Lagoon course. It's a very short course that was only recently lengthened to over the 6,000-yard mark.
In southwest Florida, the Venetian Golf and River Club in Venice has five sets of tees, going down to barely over 5,000 yards. It has some of the widest, most forgiving fairways in Florida.
On the other side of the state, Heron Bay Golf Club in Coral Springs was designed to be played in the wind. It has multiple bunkers, but easy to miss them with the wide fairways. If you're looking to go low on this course, play in the morning before the wind comes up. When it's still, Heron Bay is a pushover.
In the central part of the state, Las Colinas at the Mission Inn has forgiving fairways and soft, receptive greens. It's much flatter and friendlier than El Campeon, the other course at Mission Inn.
Falcon's Fire in Kissimmee has fairways as wide as Orlando International Airport. Most of the greens are open in front, and roll fast and true. With the open greens, this is a good course to have fun with the bump-and-run shot on your approaches, easier than aerial shots.
Lastly, as a general rule, most courses can be made much easier simply by playing them from the forward tees.
Q: I'm coming to Florida in the middle of summer to play some of my dream courses. How will the conditions of the greens be? How hot is it?
As far as conditions, June is a good month in Florida. It’s early summer, and fairways and greens all over the state should be in good shape.
Florida courses use warm-weather grass – Bermuda, in most cases – and it handles sun and heat well.
August is quite hot, as you’d imagine. But if you can handle the heat (sunscreen and hydrate, hydrate, hydrate), the courses will be delighted to see you. It’s great time to play those dream courses at great rates.
Q: I'm planning a trip to Florida from the UK during November or December for a week in the sun playing golf. Im 37, single and have a handicap of 5. Could you give me some guidance on where to start looking and recommend some suitable resorts?
Fortunately, you can’t really go wrong with any of the following.
If you want legendary nightlife, you might start looking at Miami.
Miami has South Beach as well as some excellent golf courses starting with, of course, the Blue Monster at the Doral Resort. Doral has four other courses, so you’ll never lack variety. From the city of Doral, it’s a short drive to Miami nightlife.
You couldn’t go wrong with Orlando, either. There are a number of excellent resorts in central Florida, including Bay Hill, owned by Arnold Palmer; the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress and its four Jack Nicklaus-designed courses; the Reunion Resort with Nicklaus, Palmer and Tom Watson designs; and the Omni Orlando Resort at ChampionsGate with two Greg Norman tracks. You’re never far from downtown nightlife at any of these resorts.
Tampa, of course, has a thriving nightlife and the Innisbrook Resort and Golf Club in nearby Palm Harbor has four beautiful courses, anchored by the Copperhead, a must-play if you’re in the area.
Saddlebrook is a very good option with two Palmer-designed courses.
Further north is Jacksonville, an underrated destination, with nightlife both downtown and at area beaches. The Sawgrass Marriott Resort and Spa in Ponte Vedra, at the beach, is home to TPC Sawgrass and the exceptional Stadium course. The resort also gives you access to seven area courses.
The Amelia Island Plantation is a little more serene in a beautiful part of the state and Hammock Beach Resort in Palm Coast is roughly halfway between Jacksonville and Daytona Beach. It has one of the prettiest oceanfront courses anywhere, a Nicklaus design, as well as another Watson design.
Any of these would be good choices, with some of the best golf resorts in the state and proximity to nighttime revelry.
Q: We are looking for an area that has affordable accommodations and winter memberships for golf. Is there such a thing, or are they all just pay-per-round?
There are golf clubs in Florida that offer winter memberships. There are also other ways to enjoy Florida golf in the winter at discounts, even though it is the peak season.
Snowbirds are important to Florida’s tourist economy. For example, Sandestin Golf and Beach Resort just announced a “snowbird program” that offers, among other things, discounts for golf including rounds as low as $20 and free weekly clinics.
As far as golf clubs, some of the higher-end clubs that have winter memberships include Hernando Oaks in Brooksville, with initiation fees in the $5,000 range and monthly dues starting at $350, and the private Hamlet Country Club in Delray Beach with initiation fees of $1,000 and $5,000 for a three-month membership.
Another private club, Misty Creek Country Club in Sarasota, has seasonal memberships from one to five months, for non-Florida residents.
Southern Dunes in Haines City, one of the more critically acclaimed courses in Florida and certainly worthy of repeat play, does not have seasonal memberships per se, but it does have monthly memberships as well as a Dunes Club card.
The monthly memberships are priced depending on the month, and allow play from Monday through Thursday. The card costs $129 and it’s good for a year, but it offers discounts off rack rates up to 50 percent.
At the other end of the financial scale are RV parks. Don’t laugh; the Great Outdoors Resort has a Ron Garl-designed 18-holer. Shady Brook Golf and RV resort also has an 18-holer. There are perhaps a dozen or more with nine-holers.
You could always opt for a condo or villa rental with golf memberships available. PGA National in Palm Beach Gardens or Rotonda West and Tiburon in Naples are examples. They are likely to be on the high side.
Other ways to save include the Florida Golf Trail; check to see if your home club has a reciprocal agreement.
Paradise Golf has winter memberships that allow you to play Tampa Bay area courses for as low as $99 for groups of four or more.
If the financial aspect is a concern – and when is it not? – it might be a wise idea to choose an affordable place for your winter stay, then check into area courses to see if they have seasonal memberships.
I can guarantee you that wherever you choose, there will be nearby golf courses. An excellent resource for you would be to check with other Florida snowbirds at snowbirdsfla.com. Also, all of the above clubs and organizations have websites.
Q: I am a golf fanatic looking to relocate to Florida. Is there any particular area that is your favorite?
I spent six years living in the Tampa/St. Petersburg area and can attest to the variety of great golf there. In Pinellas County, there are major resorts like Innisbrook (with four 18-hole championship courses) and classic layouts like the Belleview Biltmore, a 1925 Donald Ross-designed course that got a complete renovation a decade ago. The other side of the bay, around Tampa, is just as strong with tracks such as Westchase and TPC Tampa Bay.
As you go north from Tampa/St. Pete, the traffic dies down but the quality of golf stays high. Hernando County has Hernando Oaks in Brooksville, the Dunes Golfers Club in Weeki Wachee and nationally ranked, not-to-be-missed World Woods, also in Brooksville. Citrus County’s El Diablo is popular even with visitors from Orlando.
Home for me now is the St. Augustine/Jacksonville area, and I hang my hat frequently at TPC Sawgrass, home of THE PLAYERS Championship and the famous island-green 17th. The World Golf Village/Hall of Fame also has two excellent courses.
Almost anywhere you go in Florida will have incredible golf opportunities. If you have a destination in mind, let me know and I can help with some recommendations.
