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Condé Nast Traveler picks
 Hawaii for Golfers
To play golf in Hawaii is to be twice blessed. Wherever you are on one of the state's nearly 90 courses spread over the six main islands, you are doing something you love—and you are doing it in one of the most beautiful places on earth. All that splendor adds an especially distracting hazard to the typical course's usual complement of bunkers, ponds, and trees. And with so many choices of where to play, golfers in Hawaii face a delicious dilemma.
Big Island The Waikoloa Beach Resort, on the Kohala coast, claims two excellent courses, Kings' and Beach, both of which are scenic and challenging, with windy conditions that will remind you of links-style classics. The Mauna Kea Resort, built by Laurance Rockefeller in 1965, runs the pricey but highly rated Mauna Kea Golf Course, an early Hawaiian design by Robert Trent Jones, Sr. The nearby Hapuna Beach Prince is a more contemporary style hotel overlooking beautiful Hapuna Beach and the superb Hapuna Golf Course, an Arnold Palmer–Ed Seay collaboration. The Big Island's other 20 golf courses include the Kona Country Club's terrific Ocean and Mountain courses. For beginners, a good (and inexpensive) choice is the Hilo Municipal Golf Course. Kauai Hawaii's aptly named Garden Isle, Kauai sports some of the finest—and most famous—golf courses in the fiftieth state. With 45 holes divided between two courses (one, Makai, has three nines), the Princeville Resort, on the island's Hanalei Bay (also a surfer's mecca), is a perennial favorite. Its Prince Course, designed by Robert Trent Jones, Jr., is no picnic by the beach. This demanding shotmaker's course, with many elevation changes and all manner of natural and man-made hazards, is intoxicatingly lovely and diabolically cruel. Nursing your wounds, you would be well advised to stop at Kauai Lagoons' two Nicklaus courses en route to Trent Jones, Jr.'s other Kauaian masterpiece, Poipu Bay. This gorgeous locale, where each November the PGA's Grand Slam is contested, presents a panorama of ocean views and includes several holes built around ancient Hawaiian places of worship. Gaze out at the ocean here and you may spot a humpback whale. Birdie the demanding eighteenth, with its pond-front green, and you can join an elite fraternity that includes Tiger Woods. Lanai Seclusion on an extremely luxurious scale is the attraction of the Lodge at Koele, on the small, quiet island of Lanai. Here, if you can force yourself from the tropically induced desire not to move, you'll find two more of the best and most beautiful that Hawaii has to offer the serious golfer. Even the names are unique: the Experience at Koele (a Ted Robinson–Greg Norman creation) and the Challenge at Manele (by Jack Nicklaus). Not surprisingly, golf here comes at a premium, but when you're along the seaside lava cliffs of the Challenge or within the mountain forest of the Experience, who cares? And don't rush: The pace of life—and golf—is slower here. Maui Golfers have been known to come to Maui and never leave. Site of the PGA Tour's first tournament of the season (in early January each year), Kapalua Resort's Plantation Course (one of three at Kapalua) should be near the top of everyone's must-play wish list. This hilly, demanding layout, with sweeping views of the ocean and the beguiling isle of Lanai, tests both talent and patience: Bring your wallet and lots of golf balls, and plan on your round taking longer than usual. In the other direction from Kahului Airport, the venerable Grand Wailea Resort also has three courses: the Emerald, the Blue, and the resplendent Gold. In addition to numerous fine hotel and beach choices in Wailea, there is the added attraction of Makena State Park's unique "nineteenth hole"—secluded Little Beach, where swimsuits are very optional. Molokai The least-developed of Hawaii's main islands, Molokai is probably not the first place a golfer would go. But if you enjoy its old-fashioned, laid-back style, then you'll like the renovated Kaluakoi Golf Course and Ironwood Hills. You don't even need a tee time at either course—let alone a high limit on your credit card. Oahu Flying into Honolulu, you can tee up soon after you land at the very public, very busy, and very inexpensive Ala Wai Golf Course. Once you have your land legs under you, tackle nearby Ko‘olau—if you dare. This long, challenging track boasts a course rating from the back tees of an astonishing 152. Less difficult and a great bargain is the Navy Marine Golf Course in Honolulu. The oldest public course on the island is at the Hawaii Country Club, in Wahiawa. A much newer and more spectacular course was designed by Pete Dye for the Luana Hills Country Club, in Kailua. Truth in Travel is the guiding principle for all content published in Condé Nast Traveler. Other travel publications often accept free travel and accommodations. Condé Nast Traveler does not. It is independent of the travel industry. The magazine always pays its way, and, as far as possible, its correspondents travel anonymously. By doing so, they experience the world—both the good and the bad—as other travelers do, and their reports and recommendations are fair, impartial, and authoritative.
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