yeah I forgot to mention the weather we caught up there was perfect...not one drop of rain and highs in the 70-72 range.

side note : pretty sure the tee boxes at forest highlands could stimp out faster than a lot of the courses down here in phoenix during the summer lol

looks like a great trip and great pics. some of those tee shots over water looked pretty intimidating!

what's up with the one hole where the tree is in the fairway? unless that tree is closer than it looks, that doesn't seem very fair - there is hardly anywhere to land the ball in the fairway with a clear 2nd shot.

That is definitely the signature hole at canyon #9..it's a freaking beast! It's like 490 yard par 4 but yes the tree is farther away than it appears and plus u are way elevated from the tee.

I can hit my 3 wood up and over it no problem but u can also hit driver. The second shot is the hardest on the course as it's uphill over water and the green is wild too. Tough hole all around. Typically I just aim right and hammer a 3 wood draw and it works out okay.

Cool TR.

It's not golf in Phoenix but I played the links course in Rocky Point this weekend and had a good time. The course was in great shape and I really enjoyed the type of grass, not sure what kind it was. It felt very predictable.

Wondercall - Was it Mayan Palace golf course about 25 minutes out of Rocky Point? That place is sickkkkkkk, awesome value and 5-6 holes right along the ocean.

All - well we have hit overseeding time....there's still a few places to play the next couple of weeks and then it's over for a while....SIGH

Great pics though, thanks for sharing.

Headed up to Pinetop later this week for the WMCC men's stag. Looking to be cooler than past years unfortunately but at least it will be sunny. Guessing frost delays are going to be a factor. Three day event and planning to play Pinetop CC on Monday morning before heading back.

By the way, don't you know some guys at the Biltmore? I was heading home last night and saw a guy pulling flags, he drove right up on the green. Never seen that before in all my years of living there. I figured that maybe they were overseeding the course today so it didn't matter but no, they aren't. Links is usually about the last course in town to go down, always after Adobe. Not sure a cart can really do much damage to a green (after all, mowers...) but it was still pretty damned lazy.

I can admit Canyon has more spectacular holes...but Meadow is more fun and playable for the average player. I guess I am always a little tilted at cart path only all the time at Canyon as well....also 5 par 3's and every hole a par 3 it's tough to get in a good rhythm but I agree it's a good argument. Also we had to start on #8 this time because they were doing some work on first couple of holes so we had to start on that downhill par 3 then boom #9 which is hardest hole on the course and then #10 tough par 3 so needless to say I didn't start out too well.

Never played anywhere up in Pinetop but always heard WMCC was pretty sick.

I used to know the Knickmeyers (steve/alan) who worked at the Biltmore. I think I mentioned you one time and they said you were friends with some of the other guys that worked there but they didn't really know you too well. Steve works at Talking Stick now and Alan has worked at Orange Tree for a while so I don't know anyone there anymore.

Having worked at a golf course for 6 years...yes pulling the cart up on the green is lazy as hell. We would sometimes pull the cart within 10-15 yards of the green but that was about it. The cart tire marks would be very apparent the next morning because of the dew usually so the superintendent would always know how close we got. I always thought it was good exercise to just run up to the flag and run back to the green but to each their own.

No Durango we played at Las Palomas I believe. Our neighbor said the Mayan is the place to play and is pretty challenging so maybe next time.

wonder - las Palomas is okay but Mayan palace is a huge step up imo.

Both are fun courses but honestly Mayan palace has like 5-6 holes literally right on the beach but Las Palomas is right there next to all the resorts so I can see why it's appealing.

Well, play Torreon if you get the chance, although technically it's a ways from Pinetop so maybe you have played there. I rank it above Forest Highlands for enjoyment and particularly value - paid around $110 for the first round but same day replay was only $20. Two very fun, fair, interesting courses without nearly the pretentiousness of Forest Highlands (as a friend of mine who is a member at FH told me once, "our rules have rules). Shared clubhouse so no need to drive between rounds.

WMCC is fun but dated. I think it was build back in the 1950s. Don't worry that you're missing out on much. Despite advances in technology the course remains challenging because the primary defense is the greens, which are fairly small, very quick, generally slope back to front, tend to be crowned and fall off into deep rough. It's a classic "old man" golf course because it's not long and rewards those who hit it straight and have good short games. In other words, it's my kryptonite. It also has five par-5s, four of which are reachable but they are all pretty legit save for the 16th hole, which has a 90-degree dogleg about 240 out and is the closest thing to a Golden Tee hole I have played in real life.

played encanto on saturday lol...not a lot of options around town on a last minute booking for a reasonable price that these guys I played with would pay.

course ended up being a little better than I expected and worth the $25 bucks or whatever at 10AM that we paid.

got it really going during this round. Shot 4 under on the front, birdied 10 to get to 5 down and started thinking about how low I was going to go lolololololol and proceeded to melt away rest of the round basically. Bogeys on 16,17,18 to finish out a 69 for 1 under. Still a really nice round for me but obv when I started thinking about it, boom started hitting it off line. Need to finish it out next time....

and yes I officially went from Forest Highlands Canyon (top 3 in the state every year) to ENCANTO municipal we were laughing about that the whole time...it was like going from Selena Gomez to Honey Boo Boo's mom.

Ahwatukee cc saturday for 20. I've played this course prolly close to 100 times and I always lose at minimum 5 or 6 balls.

^ was it in decent shape?

btw my buddy played las palomas in rocky point this weekend and said it was in pretty good shape but he said he will probably only play mayan palace from now on down there

wow you're slumming lol. When I used to live in Phoenix in the late 1990s I would play Encanto from time to time in the middle of the summer. It was like $8 for unlimited holes back then if you walked in the afternoon. But it has to be the dumpiest course in the Phoenix metro area. Loved the 1st hole - that par 5 next to the driving range. There would be like 100 range balls in the fairway so you'd have to really have to pay attention to your tee shot. Even though the range balls were yellow, there were so many of them it was still pretty distracting if you were looking for your ball.

Also I think Encanto is the oldest course in Arizona, yes? It does have that "old school" feel to it - pretty straight forward and flat.

I diagree that it is the dumpiest course in the phoenix metro area. It's obviously not nice, but it's reasonably fun and wide open and great if you are playing with some people that aren't that good at golf so they can have a chance at some shots too.

if you haven't played there for a while they did some renovations on the back 9 and added a lake on the left side of #12 that makes that par 5 a lot harder and it also comes into play on another longer par 4. The front side is super easy but holes #13-17 are pretty solid imo.

I've played an asston at Encanto over the years, primarily as a junior golfer and in high school. Love that course for what it is, which is a dated but serviceable muni. I'll forever think of the park to the right of #1 as being under construction because when I played there the most in the late 80s the park was undergoing a massive renovation and the whole thing was fenced off.

Also, for years the map on the scorecards cited two "future lagoons" to the right and left of the 16th fairway (thus to the right of the 15th fairway also). That would have made 16 one bitch of a driving hole but they never got built. Instead they eventually built a "lagoon" between 12 and 15. That impacts 12 a lot more than 15 though.

Haven't played there in at least a decade but they used to have a good skins game on Tuesday afternoons that would attract some solid players. Played a ton of high school golf there but my scoring always sucked - it felt like I SHOULD absolutely destroy the course so when I didn't I would get frustrated and play worse. Probably never gave it enough credit.

^agree with what he said, it's a serviceable muni in middle of Phoenix

It's never actually in good shape, but its usually never terrible.

How does overseeding effect the courses? I never really planned my golf around it/or paid attention. I have teetimes at TN pinnacle (will be 2 weeks after overseeding) and then we ko pa where I just realized it will be the day after it's opened from reseeding.

slow shaggy greens, wet, cart path only, not fun

would really advise waiting until about a month after a course reopens to play unless you get a great deal or are just dying to play

ok, will for sure cancel we-ko-pa. Any downside to right before overseeding takes place?

right before is wayyyyyyyy better than right after....the only thing you run into right before is scalping all the grass super low and short but at least it's still playable. right after overseeding sucks and these next couple of weekends are the worst weekends of the year to golf in AZ. granted it's gorgeous outside but you'll see what we mean when you get out there...long grass, cart path only, slow greens, rounds take forever and the prices are more expensive....

saying that I can't stay away from it and playing at maryvale this weekend with some buddies just to get out. I think they will be about 25 days out from overseeding so I am expecting the worse....

Yeah I played last year during this time and remember. Having a friend visit and forgot about overseeding. Troon pinnacle has been opened for 2 weeks now so hoping it won't be too bad come the weekend. Going to look at the overseeding schedule and figure out where else to play.

yeah as a general rule, the nicer the course is the faster it recovers and is playable...also the courses in north scottsdale overseed a little earlier so if you don't mind paying like $150 it will probably be decent. Plus some of the courses have bent or hybrid greens which i believe they don't overseed up there....so they only overseed the fairway, rough and tees...

tuq with his troon card probably knows more about there than anyone and can help you out more than me