The Ultimate Insider's Guide to Golf in Orlando

The Guru is a mild-mannered type, but I get a bit miffed when writers from outside of Florida swoop in to do a review of Orlando golf. I'm figuring they play a few rounds, take some notes, snap a few pics, hoist a couple of brewskis at World of Beer and suddenly they're some kind of experts on golf in O-Town.

Sorry guys and gals, this is the Guru's turf.

Heck, the Guru has lived in Orlando for almost three decades. I know golf in Florida, especially Orlando, and I don't need some carpetbagger to come in and tell me where to tee up. I also know the top golf resorts as well as the best dining and transportation options.

Thanks for letting me get that rant out. Now, here are some of the Guru's best places to play in Orlando:

For Golfaholics
Orange County National

Orange County National (OCN), located about five miles north of Walt Disney World, welcomes all comers. Whether you're a tour player grinding on your game to get better or a novice who just stumbled out of Topgolf and now want to take up the game, OCN has everything you need. The sweeping, 900-acre complex has 36 holes of championship golf, a nine-hole practice and learning course, 42-acre practice range, 22,000 -square-foot putting green, golf academy and 33,000 square-foot clubhouse. There's even an on-site 50-room lodge for golf travelers. 

For Nicklaus, Palmer and Watson Fans
Reunion Resort

Three of golf's most influential icons, Arnold Palmer, Jack Nicklaus and Tom Watson, designed a separate signature course at the Reunion Resort near Kissimmee. The Palmer has dramatic elevation changes up to 50 feet on some holes and six tee locations on each hole. The Nicklaus, a parkland-style design, is a high-risk, high-reward gem. The Watson has fast, firm, wide fairways with a variety of interesting shot angles. All three layouts are wonderfully maintained and highly rated by numerous websites and magazines.

Best 9-hole Experience
Winter Park Golf Club

Set in the heart of the New England style village of Winter Park, 3 miles north of Orlando, this course used to be a rough-around-the-edges muni. Not Anymore. Winter Park GC underwent a terrific enhancement project in 2016 executed by up-and-coming architects Riley Johns and Keith Rhebb. Built more than 100 years ago, the course is thoroughly modern now with strategic bunkering and exceptional green complexes. It's a great little course for those who love walking and you'll absolutely love the fourth hole that doglegs around a cemetery. I enjoy strolling the fairways which are lined with beautiful mature oak trees. You'll definitely feel more of a New England than Florida vibe on this layout.

Bargain Hunter's Special
Winter Pines Golf Club

Affordable greens fees, inexpensive range balls, lots of excellent teaching pros for lessons and a snack bar with very reasonable prices for beer, breakfast and lunch are just some of the lures that make this one of Orlando's most popular golf courses for all skill levels. You'll see everything from tour pros working on their games to college kids with their hats on backwards flailing away on the range. Winter Pines is a short, fun, 18-hole layout that plays to par 67 with some 200-yard par threes and its number one handicap hole, a 400-yard par 4. How cheap is it? Monday through Thursday after 2 p.m. you can play 18 holes for $17 including cart. A large bag of range balls (50) is only $5.00.

Best Kept Secret
Red Tail Golf Club

It's about 35-minutes from the tourism corridor near the town of Sorrento, but it's well worth the drive. You won't recognize the course designer's name (Dave Harman), but, I assure you, this is a fun and interesting course to play. It's a links-style layout with mature oak trees, lush native foliage and lakes as well as a 10-acre practice facility and two practice putting greens. It's surrounded by ranch land and just a few homes so chances are you won't be bouncing any drives off pool screens. If you want to play a "hidden gem", this is it.

Arnie Fans
Bay Hill Golf Club

While Bay Hill is a private club, you receive play privileges if you stay at the 70-room Arnold Palmer's Bay Hill Club & Lodge located in southwest Orlando, which is open to the public. It's an amazing experience for Arnold Palmer fans or just any golf fan. Arnie's pictures and memorabilia from his iconic career dot the walls everywhere, from guest rooms to common areas. Just seeing photos of Palmer will remind you of everything great about the game of golf. The course, home to the PGA Tour's Arnold Palmer Invitational, is a spectacular layout that incorporates beautiful lakes, bold bunkering, elevated tees, sometimes rolling fairways and dogleg holes. Designed by Dick Wilson and Arnold Palmer, the course sweeps along the shores of the Butler Chain of Lakes with a good number of tight fairways.

Best Luxury Resort Experience
Ritz Carlton Golf Club

The Ritz-Carlton brand speaks for itself and you'll even find their exemplary service on the golf course as well. Immaculately maintained, the Greg Norman course is dotted with lakes, wetlands, live oaks and cypress heads. A Certified Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary, the course has a natural, park-like ambience making you feel like you're miles not just a couple of hundred yards from the Ritz-Carlton and JW Marriott hotels. Wide fairways with generous landing areas, no out-of-bounds stakes throughout the course, short roughs and closely mown green complexes encourage a faster pace of play. In addition, there's an optional Caddie Concierge Program. During the winter months, the caddies wear white, Augusta National-style uniforms.

Best Family Golf Resort Experience
Omni Orlando Resort at Championsgate

This amenity-loaded resort near Kissimmee has a fantastic master plan with all of the golf elements located directly behind the hotel. You have easy walking access to two championship golf courses, the world headquarters of the David Leadbetter Golf Academy, a par-3 lighted pitch and putt course and a miniature golf course. If you want to introduce your young children to golf this is the place to do it. For golfers seeking a challenge, both of the courses, designed by Greg Norman, are excellent plays, too. The headliner layout is the International, which is reminiscent of the challenging coastal links courses in Australia. The National is a traditional, parklike layout that was carved out from citrus groves, wetlands and natural forest.

Best Course With High-Impact Features
Waldorf-Astoria Golf Club

Visually appealing, this 7,108-yard Rees Jones design set behind the Waldorf-Astoria Orlando hotel is as beautiful as it is challenging. Jones has masterfully utilized the pine and cypress trees and wetland preserve to provide a scenic view on every hole. High-impact features abound on this layout, which has exaggerated mounding on many holes, undulating fairways and artistically styled bunkers with bright white sand and elevated greens.


Best Course For Links Style Golf
New Course at Grand Cypress

If you can't make it to St. Andrews, Scotland, this layout designed by Jack Nicklaus, is the next best thing with its noticeable similarities to the Old Course. A creek that fronts the first green on the New Course is similar to the Swilcan Burn at St. Andrews. The seventeenth hole at New Course resembles St. Andrew' famous Road Hole, and the fifth hole, with its bunkers on the right side of the fairway, is similar to the Principal's Nose and Deacon Sime at St. Andrews. Lending an air of authenticity to New Course are replicas of St. Andrews' stone bridges and walls, a snaking burn (creek), a starter's hut overlooking the first tee, seven double greens, five-foot flag pins, deep pot bunkers (some as deep as 12 feet) with ladders and simple white fences.

Best Places for an After-the-Round Brew

Fiddler's Green, an Irish pub/restaurant in Winter Park

World of Beer, a bar/restaurant with three locations in the Orlando area with dozens of beer selections.

Crooked Can, a craft brewery in downtown Winter Garden.

Best Transportation Options

If you've got a group, Limo Bus Orlando has an excellent fleet to accommodate a variety of your needs, large or small. For those playing golf in or visiting the Miami area, the Miami Limo Bus is a superb choice for restaurant hopping, pub crawls, parties, etc.

Best Luxury Non-Golf Hotels

Grand Bohemian Hotel in downtown Orlando

Alfond Inn in downtown Winter Park

Top 10 Finest Golf Vacation Destinations

Alisa Course at Turnberry Resort, a Guru favorite

Golf top 10 lists are a lot like broken tees. You can choose to use them or casually toss them in the nearest trash bin.

My Top 10 Finest Golf Vacation Destination list is different.

No, I don’t have an army of number crunchers sitting in cubicles studiously placing rankings on access, playability and other factors or decidedly uninformed and clueless magazine readers to determine my list.

I have a novel concept. I actually visited the destinations I ranked. 

Yes my list is subjective. It’s meant to be.

If I see you at the first tee of any of the following, you know life is fine:

1. St.Andrews, Scotland-While the experience is dominated by the Old Course, there is so much more to this historic village on the east coast of Fife in Scotland. Beyond the seven courses of the St. Andrews Links, there are phenomenal layouts like Kingsbarns, one of my favorite seaside courses in the world, the two championship layouts at Fairmont St. Andrews Resort and the Old Course Hotel's Duke's Course. Away from the courses, don't miss landmarks include the Tom Morris Golf Shop, Rusacks Hotel, Dunvegan Pub, Quarto Bookshop and the University of St. Andrews.

2. Pinehurst,North Carolina-America's answer to St. Andrews is Pinehurst Village, a wonderful place peppered with golf courses, quiet country lanes framed by large shade trees and manicured lawns. Beyond the classic Pinehurst Resort, home to Pinehurst No. 2 and seven other courses, the area has more than 40 courses to play. Here, golf doesn't play second fiddle to casinos, theme parks or shopping malls. In Pinehurst, everybody loves the game and talks "golf". Tommy Armour put it best when he said: "The man who doesn't feel emotionally stirred when he golfs at Pinehurst beneath those clear blue skies with the pine fragrance in his nostrils is one who should be ruled out of golf for life."

3. Ayrshire,Scotland-Home to my favorite golf resort, Turnberry, this part of Scotland also boasts Royal Troon, Old Prestwick and Western Gailes. One of my finest golf experiences ever was playing the Alisa Course at Turnberry, one of the game's great historical and picturesque courses. If you're looking for golf vacation nirvana, you'll find it at Turnberry.

4. Monterey Peninsula, California-Pebble Beach Golf Links (PBGL) obviously dominates the golf scene here, but there is so much more to a golf getaway in this postcard beautiful slice of northern California. There are 25 golf courses in Monterey County (17 public) and while they might not have the dramatic settings of PBGL, they're still top notch plays. Some of my favorite value plays are Pacific Grove Golf Links and the Bayonet and Black Horse courses on Monterey Bay.

5. PuntaCana, Dominican Republic-If I could only play one Caribbean course the rest of my life, it would be Corales, a seaside gem designed by Tom Fazio at Punta Cana. Six of the 18 holes are oceanfront. It's a wonderland of stunning panoramas, ocean cliff-side holes, rolling inland terrain, a rock quarry and saltwater lakefront green sites. There are also a couple of playable P.B. Dye courses at the massive resort complex, which has its own international airport allowing easy in-and-out access.

6. Canadian Rockies-Jaw dropping mountain panoramas, abundant wildlife and refreshing air without a trace of humidity enhance the experience. The phenomenal course list includes Kananaskis, Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge, Fairmont Banff Springs, Stewart Creek, Silvertip and Canmore.

7. BandonDunes, Oregon-Can't make it to Scotland. Bandon Dunes is the next best thing in the U.S. Stretching along Oregon coastline with rolling sand dunes and shaggy beach grasses, this collection of seaside links golf experiences should be on every golfer's (especially those who like to walk and play) bucket list. The offerings include four stunning 18-hole courses and the new, innovative 13-hole short course designed by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw.

8. Orlando,Florida-There are more than 125 golf courses within a 45-minute radius of downtown Orlando with designer tags like Jack Nicklaus, Greg Norman, Tom Fazio, Rees Jones and Robert Trent Jones Jr. and Sr. O-town has a great selection of resort and daily fee courses as well as economically priced Old School public layouts. Let's face it, you can play one of Orlando's top courses for less than you'd pay for a one-day ticket at a theme park.

9. LosCabos, Mexico-Set at the confluence of the Pacific Ocean and the Sea of Cortez, this resort area at the southernmost tip of Mexico's Baja Peninsula incorporates courses with designer tags by Jack Nicklaus, Tom Weiskopf and others as well as one of the world's great deep sea fishing areas, especially for those after marlin and swordfish.

10. Algarve,Portugal-There's absolutely nothing better than enjoying a glass of chilled Portugese white wine on a clubhouse veranda overlooking the ocean after a day of golf on one of the Algarve's thirty golf courses. My favorite courses include San Lorenzo Golf club at Quinta do Lago, Royal Course at Vale do Lobo and Vilamoura's Old Course. One of the world's great par threes is the oceanside 16th on the Royal at Vale do Lobo, which demands a 225-yard shot over three spectacular cliffs.