Last week, I was speaking with Kevin Hyland of TeeOff by the PGA Tour and he informed me that Paiute was the best course that I would play on during my tour. Now that is a bold statement given some of the courses that are on the list: TPC Sawgrass, Coyote Springs, Maderas… I could go on and on but there are a lot of nice courses on the list.
Paiute is in the desert north of Las Vegas. You drive and drive and see nothing resembling a golf course.
About a mile out you start to see glimpses of fairways carved into the rocks and scrubs and then you finally see the clubhouse above. When you walk into the clubhouse you see out the glass back wall something special.
There are three courses and this is the 18th hole on one of the “lesser” courses. You can’t help but be awed.
No matter what direction you look there are mountains that are awe inspiring. The course is carved out of this desert valley. There is fairway, then maybe 10 – 40 feet of rough and then rocky desert. If your ball leaves the rough, it’s gone! Golf balls and desert rocks look a lot alike.
And what is it with Pete Dye and island greens. I am beginning to believe that he got paid by golf ball manufacturers (I’m looking at you Callaway) to build this things just so we all would use more balls. (Yes, Don, I lost 2 Tin Cup style).
However, the most intimidating thing about Paiute Golf Resort was the wind.
We teed off on number 1 directly into the wind and quickly learned to adjust to the wind coming right at you. However when there was a 30 MPH cross wind like we had on the island green it was just hard to adjust to.
All in all a very fun and challenging afternoon.
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