DESTINATION GUIDES
Detroit Metro
Destination Guide
If you looked at the golf landscape in Southeast Michigan just a decade ago, the public golfing scene would seem pretty desolate. With the hub of the auto industry calling Detroit home, prestigious country clubs emerged long ago -- Oakland Hills Country Club, Franklin Hills Country Club and the Country Club of Detroit come to mind -- and are still some of the best collection of private courses in one locale in the country. Before the incredible golf boom that put Michigan on the golfing map -- and No. 1 in the nation in building new courses for five years running -- serious players in the metro Detroit area either belonged to a private club or drove up north four hours to find some good golf.
| ||||||||||
Things have changed. Now it seems good golf is just waiting around the corner, whether you live in Ann Arbor or Mount Clemens. The influx of the new upscale public courses in the last decade probably won’t ever give private clubs a run for their money, but many top public courses, like the Orchards Golf Club in Washington Township, can honestly compare themselves with country clubs.
The Orchards Golf Club’s motto is “Your Club for a Day.“ With 93 bunkers, plenty of trees and wetlands, this Robert Trent Jones Jr. design challenged the nation’s best amateurs at the U.S. Public Links in July 2002. Opened in 1992, it is considered one of the founders of the golf course boom in southeast Michigan. Designed by internationally acclaimed architect, Robert Trent Jones Jr., The Orchard can be a shot-maker's heaven or a hacker's nightmare. If you are in the neighborhood for a couple of days, check out the Glacier Club and Greystone Golf Club for one good weekend of golf.
In 2000, designer Arthur Hills hit the jackpot with Shepard’s Hollow Golf Club. Rolling through 350 acres in Clarkston, a Detroit suburb, the course is on land leased from a Society of Jesus, an order of Roman Catholic Jesuit priests. There was enough land to build 36 holes, but developers wanted to make the site unique, keeping holes far enough apart to provide some privacy and a chance to bond with nature. Four sets of tees and wide, rolling fairways allow weekend players the chance to tackle the brute with enough success to keep from getting frustrated. Each nine plays to at least 3,585 yards and four ponds speckle the property, but don't dominate the course.
Another Detroit favorite is The Majestic at Lake Walden. This 27-hole facility, designed by Jerry Matthews, is best known for its ferry boat ride across the 150-acre lake to hole No. 10 and its secluded, northern-Michigan type atmosphere.
