Houston TX Golf Weekend

T&L Golf, 1/04

Play Away: Good Ol' Boy Golf
From T&L Golf January 2004
by Brian McCallen

Most major American cities today can offer at least some degree of quality golf. But arguably none (with the possible exception of Chicago) can match Houston's diverse array of fine pay-as-you-play courses. Since 1998, the exurbs of the Big H have sprouted dozens of top daily-fee layouts, to the point that supply currently outstrips demand. This, of course, is an excellent scenario for discerning players seeking great venues, good value—and a rowdy culture guaranteed to pack the nights of any golfing trip.

Houston is, after all, the South's largest city, a panoply of urbanity at the fringe of the East Texas piney woods, an oil town run by modern-day wildcatters with a strike-it-rich mentality. As the New York Times reported last fall, "Enron knavery has done little to dampen the Bayou City's swagger and enthusiasm. Its vitality, coupled with genuine hospitality, is at the heart of Houston's appeal." A golf-rich trip to a devil-may-care city? Houston, we have no problem.

ORIENTATION
Houston's two major airports are served by more than twenty carriers: Hobby Airport is closer to downtown, but George Bush Intercontinental Airport, twenty-three miles north of town, is the city's major gateway. From there, saddle up your rental car and you're off. The downtown area is ringed by expressways that roar with traffic, upon which nearly everyone drives a pickup truck (horse trailer optional) and does 80 m.p.h. One caveat: Choose your season carefully. Houston is oppressively hot and humid in summer. Spring and fall are the best times to go, though winter days can be pleasingly mild.

PLAYING
Point your car in nearly any direction from the city center and you're likely to find not a pancake-flat oil field but a rolling, wooded golf layout with plenty of strategic interest and plenty of length. They don't build 'em short in Texas.

Start north of town at the Woodlands Resort & Conference Center, where players flock to the TPC at the Woodlands, a 1985 target-style layout with oodles of water or sand (or both) on nearly every hole. To score, check your ego at the clubhouse, keep the driver in the bag on the short par fours—and avoid the hazards at all costs. Last year the resort reworked its formerly private Pines course into a new daily-fee spread called Panther Trail. With ten reconfigured holes and eight new ones on a rolling landscape framed by trees, mounds and water, the refashioned layout offers a stimulating test.

Not far from the Woodlands, the Tradition is the star venue at the fifty-four-hole Cypresswood Golf Club. The gorgeous 1998 Keith Foster design sculpted from rolling land framed by tall pines, live oaks and sand flats puts the lie to Houston's image as a barren wasteland. Classic in appearance, the Tradition has old-fashioned virtues. Shot makers love it.

The Gulf Plain flattens out east of Houston, but a peak experience still awaits at Redstone Golf Club. Opened in 2002, Redstone was superimposed by Peter Jacobsen and Jim Hardy on the site of the former El Dorado Country Club. Marked by beautified wetlands and a paucity of bunkers, there's little here to frighten the expert, as evidenced by Fred Couples's twenty-one-under-par victory stomp in the Shell Houston Open at Redstone last spring. It's a bomber's paradise: From the tips, the back nine exceeds four thousand yards. Charlie Epps, who like Dick Harmon is among the local golf legends recruited to run Redstone, calls it a "good-ol'-buddy golf course."

West of the city, the population thins out and the land looks more Old West than Gulf Coast bayou. "This here is ranchland, son," the starter will inform you at BlackHorse Golf Club, a thirty-six-hole complex designed by Jacobsen and Hardy that opened in 2000. Its two fine courses span rolling, wooded land where horses were once raised and golfers are now tested. The North is crisscrossed by a creek and framed by majestic oaks. A broad-shouldered track marked by wide corridors, it's a beast from the tips, even for Jake and his Tour pals. The facility's South is shorter and tighter, with water in play on fourteen holes. Its par-three seventeenth sports an enormous green that rises, volcano-like, from the marsh. On a breezy day, it's one of the best one-shotters in Texas.

Also west of Houston is Meadowbrook Farms Golf Club, a well-groomed eighteen designed by Greg Norman that offers exceptional diversity. Wetlands, ponds and a tree-lined bayou must be avoided off the tees. Plateau greens, many bunkerless and embraced by close-mowed hollows, shrug off indifferent approaches. This subtle test is possibly Norman's finest daily-fee course in the U.S.

Not all embrace the knockoff aesthetic of replica courses, but for those who do, Houston has two good options. Tour 18, opened in 1992, was the first facility to copy holes from famous clubs. It doesn't quite carry its billing as "America's Greatest Eighteen Holes," but its faux Amen Corner and watery holes inspired by Bay Hill and Doral are decent. Better by far is the newer Augusta Pines Golf Club, its front nine a liberal interpretation of the storied back nine at Augusta National. The layout's back nine borrows from Oakland Hills, Pinehurst and others, though the holes are inspirations, not clones. Site of a Champions Tour event, Augusta Pines is derivative but likable.

And don't overlook the golf in the heart of downtown at Memorial Park Golf Course, a formerly beat-up muni treated to a major makeover in the mid-1990s. This legendary track is where Jimmy Demaret and Tommy Bolt got their start and where hustlers once huddled at the low brick wall outside the pro shop to size up their prospects. It endures 65,000 rounds per year, and its condition is far from perfect, but if you want to rub elbows with the locals, this tree-lined track framed by glass-and-steel towers is an urban layout worth cherishing.

STAYING
At the edge of Memorial Park, the Houstonian Hotel, Club & Spa is a leafy eighteen-acre enclave that's an oasis of serenity in the middle of the city. Deep in the heart of downtown, nestled among the city's skyscrapers, the Sam Houston Hotel is a venerable ten-story brick edifice that reopened as a 100-room boutique hotel in 2002 after a major makeover. Traveling on business? The Hilton Americas-Houston, a 1,200-room hotel that debuted in December 2003, adjoins the George R. Brown Convention Center.

For a pleasant full-service resort experience, there's the Woodlands Resort & Conference Center. Built almost thirty years ago, this Frank Lloyd Wright-inspired resort has steadily improved itself. It now offers 490 rooms and suites, two fine courses (see above), five eateries and lounges, a spa and fitness center, twenty-one tennis courts and the Forest Oasis Waterscape—one very cool new pool with a double-helix racing slide.

DINING
Houston institutions mix with eclectic newcomers in a culinary melting pot where Texas Creole and Asian Cajun were born. Ever-popular Café Annie (713-840-1111), where crawfish tails and venison sausage are spun into delectable entrées, has elevated Southwestern cuisine to high art. Hugo's (713-524-7744) veers from basic Tex-Mex to the haute cuisine of Mexico City. Where else to get duck mole or achiote-rubbed grouper grilled in a banana leaf? Artista (713-278-4782) features trendy mix-and-match cuisine. For local flair and select beef with wines to match, try Pappas Bros. Steakhouse (713-780-7352), a cigar-friendly haunt favored by oil tycoons. Among the city's beloved mainstays is Goode Company Barbecue (713-522-2530), a smokehouse that slow-cooks some of Texas's best briskets. Save room for the pecan pie.

OTHER ATTRACTIONS
Begin your exploration of Houston with the exploration of space at NASA's Space Center Houston (281-244-2100). Reliant Stadium, home of the NFL's Houston Texans and site of the 2004 Super Bowl, is also home to the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo (832-667-1000), the world's largest rodeo, March 2-21. If you're looking to be awed by a different type of physicality, catch a Houston Rockets (877-622-7625) game at the new downtown Toyota Center, all the better to contain the seven-foot-six-inches of Yao Ming. Located within Hermann Park is the Houston Museum of Natural Science (713-639-4629) and its enchanting live butterfly center.

For the arts, Houston's seventeen-block downtown Theater District is home to the Houston Grand Opera (713-228-6737), Houston Ballet (713-523-6300), Houston Symphony (713-224-7575) and the Alley Theatre (713-228-8421). Among the highlights of the city's museum district is the Museum of Fine Arts (713-639-7300), which houses an amazingly diverse collection, and the somber Rothko Chapel (713-524-9839), with fourteen subtle works by Mark Rothko.

PLAYING
CYPRESSWOOD GOLF CLUB (TRADITION), Spring; 281-821-6300. Yardage/Slope: 7,220/134. Greens Fee: $55. Architect: Keith Foster, 1998. T+L GOLF Rating: ****1/2

MEADOWBROOK FARMS GOLF CLUB, Katy; 281-693-4653. Yardage/Slope: 7,100/137. Greens Fees: $62-$85. Architect: Greg Norman, 1999. T+L GOLF Rating: ****1/2

AUGUSTA PINES GOLF CLUB, Spring; 832-381-1010. Yardage/Slope: 7,041/125. Greens Fees: $62-$79. Architect: Tour 18 Inc., 2000. T+L GOLF Rating: ****

BLACKHORSE GOLF CLUB, Cypress; 281-304-1747. Yardage/Slope: North, 7,305/130; South, 7,171/138. Greens Fees: $55-$80. Architects: Peter Jacobsen and Jim Hardy, 2000. T+L GOLF Rating: **** (Both)

PANTHER TRAIL, The Woodlands; 281-367-1100. Yardage/Slope: 7,044/130. Greens Fees: $63-$83. Architect: Roy Case, 2003. T+L GOLF Rating: ****

REDSTONE GOLF CLUB, Humble; 281-454-6590. Yardage/Slope: 7,508/133. Greens Fees: $145-$160. Architects: Jacobsen/Hardy, 2002. T+L GOLF Rating: ****

TPC AT THE WOODLANDS, The Woodlands; 281-367-1100. Yardage/Slope: 7,018/136. Greens Fees: $85-$125. Architects: Bruce Devlin and Robert von Hagge, 1985. T+L GOLF Rating: ****

MEMORIAL PARK GOLF COURSE, Houston; 713-862-4033. Yardage/Slope: 7,164/122. Greens Fees: $22.50-$32. Architects: John Bredemus, 1936; Baxter Spann,1995. T+L GOLF Rating: ***1/2

TOUR 18, Humble; 281-540-1818. Yardage/Slope: 6,782/129. Greens Fees: $59-$89. Architects: Dennis Wilkerson and Dave Edsall, 1992. T+L GOLF Rating: ***1/2

STAYING
HILTON AMERICAS-HOUSTON, 713-739-8000. Rooms: $159-$379.
HOUSTONIAN HOTEL, CLUB & SPA, 800-231-2759. Rooms: $169-$395. Suites: $600-$1,600.
SAM HOUSTON HOTEL, 832-200-8800. Rooms: $159-$229. Suites: $259-$379.
WOODLANDS RESORT & CONFERENCE CENTER, 800-433-2624. Rooms: $99-$269. Suites: $139-$1,400.