There are a lot of courses in the Washington, DC, metro area, but only a few top the leaderboard. They include a fabulous new course (opened July 1, 2003) designed by a former lead architect for Gary Player who is now on his own and two courses by Arthur Hills and Tom Fazio whose wonderfully challenging and aesthetic work graces a northern Virginia private club that is open to membership inquiries. Read on, and make your next stay in Washington a capital one.

Heritage Hunt Golf and Country Club

This gated golf and country club community located just off I-66 in Gainesville, Va., is marketed as an Active Adult community. Residents (home buyers) must be 55 or older. The club offers various categories of membership to both residents and non-residents alike. While many homes have already been built and purchased, the overall development plan calls for additional separate family homes and condo units on the golf course that you may want to look into. U.S. Home, a division of Lennar Corp., is the development company while the golf operation is managed by Western Golf Properties, which also manages Stonewall Golf Club nearby.

The percussion is heard 75 miles away, near Greensboro midway between Atlanta and Augusta. Here, off I-20 in the state’s central farm belt, is Reynolds Plantation, a 7,000-acre lakeside residential and resort community that is zooming to the top of golfers’ travel lists.

The course was designed by famed architect Arthur Hills, whose portfolio includes Blue Mash and Waverly Woods in Maryland, and the River Course at Lowes Island near Leesburg. Hills’ signature trademark of mounds is stamped on this layout which features a string of three holes on the back nine called Arthur’s Alley that are as challenging as they are scenic. The best of these is number 14, a stunning hole lined all the way on the left by a ridge of thick woods. The tee shot must carry an upland marsh, the fairway bends noticeably to the right and is dissected by a creek.

Bent grass maintained to exacting standards assures you of excellent playing conditions. Practice facilities include a fine short game area. Heritage has two clubhouses, one of which serves a splendid fitness center and an indoor and outdoor pool. The main clubhouse, designed in southern ante-bellum style and including a second-floor verandah has in addition to the golf shop, a first-rate restaurant featuring a great Sunday brunch, a 340-capacity banquet room, and card and pool rooms.

Heritage invites you to visit its property and explore its home sites and golf memberships.

Heritage Hunt Golf
and Country Club
Gainesville, Va.
703-743-1000
www.heritagegolf.com

Whiskey Creek Golf Club

One of the most scenic and best maintained daily fee golf courses in the metro area is Whiskey Creek. Located about 8 miles east of I-270 and 10 miles from Frederick, Whiskey Creek was designed with PGA pro Ernie Else serving as consultant. The course sits on what was formerly a wheat and barley farm where whiskey was once distilled back in the days when German immigrants settled here. A ruins of an old farmhouse sits in the middle of the 18^th fairway some 275 yards from the tee box.

Situated in the Maryland Piedmont, the land rises and falls, sometimes dramatically, creating excellent vistas of the surrounding countryside and featuring rock outcroppings. The contours of the site also made it possible to create some holes with sharp elevation changes. For example, the 404-yard 5^th fall about 100 feet from tee box to fairway, while a slightly shorter drop marks the dramatic 14^th hole which includes a lake lining the left side of the fairway. The most dramatic hole is the 425-yard 12^th, which starts from an elevated tee. The drive must carry a deep ravine to a rising fairway which dips sharply down to another ravine which must be carried to reach the green. It is one of the most beautiful and treacherous holes in the DC area.

Whiskey Creek is among the top upscale daily fee courses that is definitely worth a visit. While it is testy, it is very fair, with wide fairways. The par 3’s are excellent, topped by the stunning 11^th, a 200-yarder over an upland marsh to a green guarded by a long bunker on the right with woods further right.

The clubhouse is cozy and is designed in a ski chalet style with nice restaurant and other golf amenities. Outings are welcome.

Whiskey Creek Golf Club
888-883-1174/301-694-2900
www.whiskeycreekgolf.com

Little Bennett Golf Course

Little Bennett is one of half a dozen courses of the Montgomery County (Maryland) Department of Parks and Planning. It is located in Clarksburg, Md., not far off exit 22 on I-270 in Little Bennett Regional Park. It is a few miles south as the crow flies from whiskey Creek.

Designed by Michael Hurdzan, who is fast becoming a widely recognized name in the golf architecture field, the course is one of the hilliest in the metro area. It is also one of the best maintained courses.

The course sprawls over hill and down dale, through trees, over and around ravines and up steep slopes. Some holes are lined with trees, others are quite open. No two holes are alike on this visually interesting site. Holes of note include the short par-3 6^th which drops some 100 feet over a ravine to a two-tiered severely contoured and sloping green. The 425-yard 9^th requires a very long second shot over another steep ravine to a well bunkered green. One of the most dramatic holes if the 570-yard 10^th requiring a drive over yet another ravine to a fairway that slopes continuously upward to the green. Usually played into the wind, this hole is unreachable in two for all but the mightiest hitters.

Little Bennett’s fees are among the most competitive in the area. The clubhouse is spacious and inviting with a snack bar and golf shop. The service is very friendly and informal. Outings are invited.

Little Bennett Golf Course
301-253-1515/800-366-2012
www.mc-mncppc.org/parks/facilities/bennett.shtm

Old Hickory Golf Club

The centerpiece of the new community of River Falls in Prince William County is this breathtaking layout designed by Tim Freeland. Formerly the lead architect for Gary Player, who designed Raspberry Falls in Leesburg, Va., Freeland is now on his own, and Old Hickory is his first signature course.

Opened July 1, 2003, and located just off Prince William Parkway in Lake Ridge, Va., the semi-private golf club is particularly convenient to the I-95 corridor and golfers living in Prince William and adjacent counties. It is the only daily fee course in the county.

Old Hickory is a stunning design, featuring holes with dramatic elevation changes in a thickly wooded setting. The generally wide fairways are framed thoughtfully by large bunkers and mounds or high banks. The fairways pitch and roll to photogenic green complexes with hardwood backdrops.

The course makes you think. On more than a few holes, success depends on what side of the fairway you place your tee shot. Some holes, including the par 5 3^rd, featuring two large fairway bunkers that split the fairway just in front of the green, present interesting risk-reward decisions. Yet, for all its mental challenge, the course is fair. Relatively little earth was moved to create a course that lays out naturally, and beautifully, on the land. Featuring some of the best, most visually exciting par 3’s you will ever play, Old Hickory has greatness stamped all over it.

Managed by the same group that manages Raspberry Falls, Old Hickory promises to be one of the best maintained, best serviced courses in the metro area. It features bent grass throughout including state-of-the-art A-4 bent on the greens.

Unlike most golf course communities, the development plan at Old Hickory was driven by the golf operation. Freeland had wide latitude to route a course exactly as he envisioned it. The developers include some of the top names in the industry and the plan calls for a restricted number of luxurious brick homes on fewer than half the holes. For the most part, the homes will have generous set backs from the areas of play.

The clubhouse is scheduled to open in the late fall of 2003 while the practice range and instruction are now available. Old Hickory is a regional headquarters of the PGA’s new Link Up 2 Golf Program, which is designed to introduce new golfers to all aspects of the game. The program includes lessons in the golf swing, on-course clinics, and instruction in dress and etiquette. The program’s regional director is club Director of Golf Steve Clark. The program is open to anyone interested in starting golf.

Old Hickory is also distinguished by a 19^th hole--a par 3 “match breaker.”

Old Hickory Golf Club
Lake Ridge/Woodbridge , Va.
703-580-6015
www.golfoldhickory.com

Lowes Island Club

Lowes Island is bounded on the west by the Potomac River and is separated from the mainland by a small tributary of Sugarland Run. The tributary winds through the valley and empties into the river in Potomac Falls, Va. Deer, fox, heron and other wildlife roam here in abundance. It’s a lovely secluded and serene spot.

Its also here where two of the top golf course designers in the world—Arthur Hills and Tom Fazio--created two delightful golf courses. Thanks to these two gems, the Lowes Island Club is arguably the finest two-golf-course private club in the area, with the possible exception of Congressional.

The River Course, designed by Hills, is the newer of the two and is largely a treeless, windswept links style layout with water on most holes, some of which run directly along the river. Though the land is flat, Hills has created a masterpiece that is enhanced by some of the finest turf conditions of any local club. The equally well conditioned Fazio-designed Island Course is slightly more traditional, with more elevation changes and a few holes that are carved through woods in the upland region of the property. Both courses have hosted major local tournaments.

The large Cape Cod-style clubhouse sits on a bluff overlooking the dramatic first hole of the Island Course and includes a gourmet restaurant with indoor and outdoor patio seating. The club also has a large outdoor swimming pool and tennis courts within easy walking distance of the clubhouse. As you walk the plush carpeting and observe the grill- and woodwork inside the clubhouse, you get an unmistakable sense of luxury and pride.

The club, which is owned by Chevy Chase Bank, currently has some 700 members and is aiming for about 900. Lowes Island Club is very much a family oriented club with active programs in tennis, swimming and golf for members of all ages. Noteworthy to the diplomatic community, half of the initiation fee is refunded upon a member’s resignation from the club.

Lowes Island Club
Sterling, Va. (near Leesburg)
703-444-4801
www.lowesisland.com

Regular Washington Diplomat magazine contributor Alan B. Nichols has reviewed courses and golf resorts in the U.S., Great Britain, and the Dominican Republic.