Black Mesa is a must. Paa-Ko Ridge is one of my favorite courses in the world. Which ones are your favorites in New Mexico?
Golf on the Santa Fe Trail
From Fairway to Green Magazine, United Kingdom
By David R. Holland
SANTA FE, New Mexico – That cowboy (or Native American) riding off into the sunset just might have his golf bag strapped to the back of his horse.
This is New Mexico – still somewhat wild, always ruggedly beautiful, and if you are a travel golf enthusiast with a craving to explore the old west, this is a destination that will make your spurs jingle-jangle. Life has come a long way since the days of Kit Carson and Billy The Kid.
Golf on the Santa Fe Trail includes eight superlative golf courses, all within a two-hour drive, located near destinations of the Old Santa Fe Trail. From the high desert moonscapes of Black Mesa, to cool mountain air, craggy sandstone ridges and pinon-junipers of Paa-Ko Ridge, this is the most affordable, noteworthy golf in the USA. Arizona is exceptional folks, but you will find golf matching the same desert earthiness in New Mexico for significantly less dollars.
And few know that New Mexico is the birthplace of Native American golf. The Inn of the Mountain Gods near Ruidoso was the first back in 1976. Today, that list of tribal-owned courses in the USA is past 50 in 17 states with at least 20 more in the planning stages.
Currently, six New Mexico pueblos own golf courses – Cochiti, Pojoaque, Santa Ana, Santa Clara, Isleta and Mescalero Apache.
Surrounding states, like Texas, are proud of their cowboy heritage, but New Mexico is a fascinating combination of Native American, Spanish, Anglo, African and Asian. You can certainly taste it in the food spiced with the chile pepper and feel it in the American southwest lifestyle.
Santa Fe is the oldest capital city in the United States, founded in 1610, but the Pueblo Indians have called it home for more than 1,000 years. And as the Spanish colonists ventured here in 1598 to establish Santa Fe as Spain’s throne of power north of the Rio Grande River – others were attracted to the area because of its pleasant weather.
With a scenic backdrop of the Sangre de Cristo mountains, Santa Fe today is homey but also high-browed artsy, chic and creative. It is the address of the world-renowned Santa Fe Opera, and has the third-largest art market in the United States (behind New York and Los Angeles). Little wonder the city regularly ranks as one of America’s top-ten tourist destinations.
But I didn’t come for enlightened culture – I came for agriculture – golf courses, that is. And I prefer to see my sunsets from a golf cart.
Black Mesa Golf Club, some 30 minutes west of the city, is a beautiful, stark desert landscape, and deadly. More than a few have noticed the sign in the clubhouse of this Santa Clara Pueblo layout. It says simply: Big Course, Big Medicine—it will kick your butt. At every turn on this 7,307-yard course, par 72, mental strategy is vital and roller-coaster greens are daunting. One hole, the par five, 536-yard sixteenth is uphill and nicknamed “Stairway to Seven”.
Part owner-superintendent Pat Brockwell says it best: “This course makes me focus on my approach. You have to think about strategy and that means you can’t always aim at the flag. You must leave approach shots in the right spots.
Students of the game and better golfers are tickled about the challenge.” Black Mesa is ranked No. 35 on Golf Magazine’s Top 100 (USA) You Can Play List.
Located just minutes away, located in Pojoaque, and just 12 miles north of Santa Fe, is Towa Golf Resort. It includes the brand-new Buffalo Thunder Resort four-star destination that will includes the 390-room Hilton Santa Fe North, a luxury spa and fitness facility, several restaurants, entertainment venues, meeting space and a new upscale casino.
Towa includes 27 of 36 planned holes, designed by Hale Irwin and William Phillips. There’s the Pinon nine, designed by Irwin, and the Boulder and Butterfly nines designed by Phillips. The most memorable shot might come on the Boulder nine’s par three, 186-yard fourth hole. It requires a tee shot to New Mexico’s only island green.
Elevated tee boxes provide panoramic views of a pinon and juniper dotted landscape, boulder canyons, and the Sangre De Cristo mountain range.
Following all the traditions and golf in Santa Fe it is only a short drive down I-25 to Albuquerque, world-famous for its Balloon Fiesta in October, and another modern-day byway – Route 66. Many historians will tell you that this high-desert city never really had to deal with an abundance of outlaws during the Wild West era when six-shooters blazed and countless tombstones were raised. By the late 1800s a blended civilization 150 years old was already in place in Albuquerque.
Golf came later, but when you gaze on the verdant fairways, red-dirt arroyos, and massive buttes of Twin Warriors Golf Club, located on the Santa Ana Reservation just north of town, you will see a spacious course measuring 7,736 yards from the Tour Tees, designed by Gary Panks through 20 ancient sites of tribal habitation and activity.
A towering volcanic “thumb” called Tuyunna Butte or Snakehead, is just above the 16th hole, and considered sacred by the Santa Ana pueblo. Teamed with a view of the Rio Grande River, its lush cottonwood forest, and the Sandia Mountains, the ritzy Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa is a luxurious complement. Amazingly, Twin Warriors, ranked No. 69 nationally by Golf Digest, is New Mexico’s only daily-fee beauty with green fees over $100. And just a minute away are 27 more holes of the Santa Ana Golf Club, said to have some of the best rolling greens in the state.
Finish your Albuquerque golf experience with three more heralded courses – Sandia Golf Club, Isleta Eagle Golf Course and The University of New Mexico Championship Golf Course.
Sandia Golf Club is the newest offering, a 7,711-yard, par 72 Scott Miller design, that is also home to the Sandia Resort and Casino. This is a true Arizona-styled desert layout, with the Sandia Mountains as a backdrop. Golf Magazine named it one of the “Top 10 New Courses You Can Play” in the USA when it opened in 2005.
On the course you face a playable 18 that includes decomposed granite in rough areas as well as irritable bunkers, lakes and large putting surfaces. The 16,000-square foot “Pueblo style” clubhouse is impressive as is the hotel that looms over the 18th hole that concludes with a downhill fairway and green framed by water.
The University of New Mexico Championship Golf Course, designed by Red Lawrence, is locally known as UNM South or “the Monster” and measures 7,279 yards. You can expect the unexpected on this course dotted with traps, water hazards, elevated greens and tees, gullies and ridges. Tiger Woods won his first collegiate tournament here in 1994.
Opened in 1967, it hosted the 1992 and 1998 NCAA men’s national golf championships. Hit it crooked here and suffer the consequences of loose desert sand or sagebrush.
Just south of town, near the airport and bordering the bosque of the Rio Grande is Isleta Eagle Golf Course, part of the Pueblo of Isleta. Opened in 1996, it includes 27 holes with Sandia Mountain views and holes that play around three lakes. The nines are named Lakes, Arroyo and Mesa and were designed by Bill Phillips.
Throughout the nine, beware of the thick bluegrass-rye rough.
Finally, save New Mexico’s best golf course for last. Head to the eastern slope of the Sandia Mountains, only 30 minutes from downtown to Paa-Ko Ridge.
Ranked No. 30 on Golf Magazine’s Top 100 You Can Play List, this Ken Dye design is set in the stunning rock outcroppings,
pinon-juniper terrain, and includes wow factor views from every tee box.
Today’s experience includes 27 strategic holes (original 18 is 7,562 yards) with nine added in 2005, as golfers face daunting carries over arroyos, gnarly bluegrass rough, bowled fairways, lakes, elevated greens with deep cascading bunkers, and scenery from mountain-top tee boxes that make you want to hang glide.
This golf course should be on everyone’s must-play list. If you only have time to play one golf course in New Mexico make it Paa-Ko Ridge.
Yep, the Santa Fe Trail has attracted many characters in its history—from dry goods proprietors and snake oil salesmen, gold and silver seekers and claim jumpers, and cattle barons and cattle rustlers. Now, it’s a magnet for outdoors enthusiasts swinging big sticks.
(David R. Holland is a former sportswriter for The Dallas Morning News and author of The Colorado Golf Bible, www.coloradogolfbible.googlepages.com). He writes for four regional golf magazines, one national golf magazine and one international golf magazine.
Santa Fe Convention and Visitors Bureau:
800-777-2489, www.santafe.org
Did you know?
The only Native American PGA Tour player is Notah Begay, but the most successful professional golfer in New Mexico history is LPGA Hall of Famer Nancy Lopez of Roswell, site of the legendary 1947 UFO incident.
2008 Golfweek’s Best Courses You Can Play
New Mexico
1. Paa-Ko Ridge, Sandia Park (No. 43 nationally)
2. Black Mesa, La Mesilla (No. 73 nationally)
3. Pinon Hills Golf Club, Farmington
4. Twin Warriors, Santa Ana Pueblo
5. University of New Mexico (South), Albuquerque
6. Sandia Golf Club, Albuquerque
7. Sonoma Ranch, Las Cruces
8. Taos Golf Club, Taos
9. Pueblo de Cochiti Golf Club, Cochiti
10. Inn of the Mountain Gods, Mescalero
Black Mesa is a must. Paa-Ko Ridge is one of my favorite courses in the world. Which ones are your favorites in New Mexico?
Golf on the Santa Fe Trail
From Fairway to Green Magazine, United Kingdom
By David R. Holland
SANTA FE, New Mexico – That cowboy (or Native American) riding off into the sunset just might have his golf bag strapped to the back of his horse.
This is New Mexico – still somewhat wild, always ruggedly beautiful, and if you are a travel golf enthusiast with a craving to explore the old west, this is a destination that will make your spurs jingle-jangle. Life has come a long way since the days of Kit Carson and Billy The Kid.
Golf on the Santa Fe Trail includes eight superlative golf courses, all within a two-hour drive, located near destinations of the Old Santa Fe Trail. From the high desert moonscapes of Black Mesa, to cool mountain air, craggy sandstone ridges and pinon-junipers of Paa-Ko Ridge, this is the most affordable, noteworthy golf in the USA. Arizona is exceptional folks, but you will find golf matching the same desert earthiness in New Mexico for significantly less dollars.
And few know that New Mexico is the birthplace of Native American golf. The Inn of the Mountain Gods near Ruidoso was the first back in 1976. Today, that list of tribal-owned courses in the USA is past 50 in 17 states with at least 20 more in the planning stages.
Currently, six New Mexico pueblos own golf courses – Cochiti, Pojoaque, Santa Ana, Santa Clara, Isleta and Mescalero Apache.
Surrounding states, like Texas, are proud of their cowboy heritage, but New Mexico is a fascinating combination of Native American, Spanish, Anglo, African and Asian. You can certainly taste it in the food spiced with the chile pepper and feel it in the American southwest lifestyle.
Santa Fe is the oldest capital city in the United States, founded in 1610, but the Pueblo Indians have called it home for more than 1,000 years. And as the Spanish colonists ventured here in 1598 to establish Santa Fe as Spain’s throne of power north of the Rio Grande River – others were attracted to the area because of its pleasant weather.
With a scenic backdrop of the Sangre de Cristo mountains, Santa Fe today is homey but also high-browed artsy, chic and creative. It is the address of the world-renowned Santa Fe Opera, and has the third-largest art market in the United States (behind New York and Los Angeles). Little wonder the city regularly ranks as one of America’s top-ten tourist destinations.
But I didn’t come for enlightened culture – I came for agriculture – golf courses, that is. And I prefer to see my sunsets from a golf cart.
Black Mesa Golf Club, some 30 minutes west of the city, is a beautiful, stark desert landscape, and deadly. More than a few have noticed the sign in the clubhouse of this Santa Clara Pueblo layout. It says simply: Big Course, Big Medicine—it will kick your butt. At every turn on this 7,307-yard course, par 72, mental strategy is vital and roller-coaster greens are daunting. One hole, the par five, 536-yard sixteenth is uphill and nicknamed “Stairway to Seven”.
Part owner-superintendent Pat Brockwell says it best: “This course makes me focus on my approach. You have to think about strategy and that means you can’t always aim at the flag. You must leave approach shots in the right spots. Students of the game and better golfers are tickled about the challenge.” Black Mesa is ranked No. 35 on Golf Magazine’s Top 100 (USA) You Can Play List.
Located just minutes away, located in Pojoaque, and just 12 miles north of Santa Fe, is Towa Golf Resort. It includes the brand-new Buffalo Thunder Resort four-star destination that will includes the 390-room Hilton Santa Fe North, a luxury spa and fitness facility, several restaurants, entertainment venues, meeting space and a new upscale casino.
Towa includes 27 of 36 planned holes, designed by Hale Irwin and William Phillips. There’s the Pinon nine, designed by Irwin, and the Boulder and Butterfly nines designed by Phillips. The most memorable shot might come on the Boulder nine’s par three, 186-yard fourth hole. It requires a tee shot to New Mexico’s only island green.
Elevated tee boxes provide panoramic views of a pinon and juniper dotted landscape, boulder canyons, and the Sangre De Cristo mountain range.
Following all the traditions and golf in Santa Fe it is only a short drive down I-25 to Albuquerque, world-famous for its Balloon Fiesta in October, and another modern-day byway – Route 66. Many historians will tell you that this high-desert city never really had to deal with an abundance of outlaws during the Wild West era when six-shooters blazed and countless tombstones were raised. By the late 1800s a blended civilization 150 years old was already in place in Albuquerque.
Golf came later, but when you gaze on the verdant fairways, red-dirt arroyos, and massive buttes of Twin Warriors Golf Club, located on the Santa Ana Reservation just north of town, you will see a spacious course measuring 7,736 yards from the Tour Tees, designed by Gary Panks through 20 ancient sites of tribal habitation and activity.
A towering volcanic “thumb” called Tuyunna Butte or Snakehead, is just above the 16th hole, and considered sacred by the Santa Ana pueblo. Teamed with a view of the Rio Grande River, its lush cottonwood forest, and the Sandia Mountains, the ritzy Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa is a luxurious complement. Amazingly, Twin Warriors, ranked No. 69 nationally by Golf Digest, is New Mexico’s only daily-fee beauty with green fees over $100. And just a minute away are 27 more holes of the Santa Ana Golf Club, said to have some of the best rolling greens in the state.
Finish your Albuquerque golf experience with three more heralded courses – Sandia Golf Club, Isleta Eagle Golf Course and The University of New Mexico Championship Golf Course. Sandia Golf Club is the newest offering, a 7,711-yard, par 72 Scott Miller design, that is also home to the Sandia Resort and Casino. This is a true Arizona-styled desert layout, with the Sandia Mountains as a backdrop. Golf Magazine named it one of the “Top 10 New Courses You Can Play” in the USA when it opened in 2005.
On the course you face a playable 18 that includes decomposed granite in rough areas as well as irritable bunkers, lakes and large putting surfaces. The 16,000-square foot “Pueblo style” clubhouse is impressive as is the hotel that looms over the 18th hole that concludes with a downhill fairway and green framed by water.
The University of New Mexico Championship Golf Course, designed by Red Lawrence, is locally known as UNM South or “the Monster” and measures 7,279 yards. You can expect the unexpected on this course dotted with traps, water hazards, elevated greens and tees, gullies and ridges. Tiger Woods won his first collegiate tournament here in 1994.
Opened in 1967, it hosted the 1992 and 1998 NCAA men’s national golf championships. Hit it crooked here and suffer the consequences of loose desert sand or sagebrush.
Just south of town, near the airport and bordering the bosque of the Rio Grande is Isleta Eagle Golf Course, part of the Pueblo of Isleta. Opened in 1996, it includes 27 holes with Sandia Mountain views and holes that play around three lakes. The nines are named Lakes, Arroyo and Mesa and were designed by Bill Phillips.
Throughout the nine, beware of the thick bluegrass-rye rough. Finally, save New Mexico’s best golf course for last. Head to the eastern slope of the Sandia Mountains, only 30 minutes from downtown to Paa-Ko Ridge.
Ranked No. 30 on Golf Magazine’s Top 100 You Can Play List, this Ken Dye design is set in the stunning rock outcroppings, pinon-juniper terrain, and includes wow factor views from every tee box.
Today’s experience includes 27 strategic holes (original 18 is 7,562 yards) with nine added in 2005, as golfers face daunting carries over arroyos, gnarly bluegrass rough, bowled fairways, lakes, elevated greens with deep cascading bunkers, and scenery from mountain-top tee boxes that make you want to hang glide.
This golf course should be on everyone’s must-play list. If you only have time to play one golf course in New Mexico make it Paa-Ko Ridge.
Yep, the Santa Fe Trail has attracted many characters in its history—from dry goods proprietors and snake oil salesmen, gold and silver seekers and claim jumpers, and cattle barons and cattle rustlers. Now, it’s a magnet for outdoors enthusiasts swinging big sticks.
(David R. Holland is a former sportswriter for The Dallas Morning News and author of The Colorado Golf Bible, www.coloradogolfbible.googlepages.com). He writes for four regional golf magazines, one national golf magazine and one international golf magazine.
Where to play
Golf on the Santa Fe Trail, www.golfonthesantafetrail.com, (866) 465-3660
Where to stay
Marriott, www.marriott.com, (505) 881-6800, I-40 and Louisiana, Albuquerque
Hyatt Regency Tamaya, www.hyatt.com, (505) 867-1234, Albuquerque
Homewood Suites by Hilton, Santa Fe-North, www.citiesofgolf.com, (505) 455-9100, Pojoaque
Helpful phone numbers, websites Albuquerque Convention and Visitors Bureau:
800-733-9918 ext. 3339, www.itsatrip.org
Santa Fe Convention and Visitors Bureau: 800-777-2489, www.santafe.org
Did you know?
The only Native American PGA Tour player is Notah Begay, but the most successful professional golfer in New Mexico history is LPGA Hall of Famer Nancy Lopez of Roswell, site of the legendary 1947 UFO incident.
2008 Golfweek’s Best Courses You Can Play
New Mexico
1. Paa-Ko Ridge, Sandia Park (No. 43 nationally) 2. Black Mesa, La Mesilla (No. 73 nationally) 3. Pinon Hills Golf Club, Farmington 4. Twin Warriors, Santa Ana Pueblo 5. University of New Mexico (South), Albuquerque 6. Sandia Golf Club, Albuquerque 7. Sonoma Ranch, Las Cruces 8. Taos Golf Club, Taos 9. Pueblo de Cochiti Golf Club, Cochiti 10. Inn of the Mountain Gods, Mescalero