Endless summer

By Matthew Rudy
Photo By J.D. Cuban
Maps By Jason Lee June 2008

You could argue that to be truly great, a golf destination must be hard to reach. To play it, you've got to want it -- not just show up on the way to somewhere else.

Bandon Dunes is undeniably remote and its credentials are unmatched. The first course opened in 1999, and its three layouts are among the top 25 in America's 100 Greatest Public Courses. If propeller planes make you skittish, it's a 10-hour drive from San Francisco.

But this is no ordinary drive.

For 530 miles, California Route 1 careens around mountain hairpins, edges along 1,000-foot oceanside cliffs, then angles through old-growth redwood forests before returning to the seaside at the Oregon border. And it's golf season 12 months of the year. Sign me up.

I needed all-wheel drive, luggage space and enough legroom for the long trip, so I requisitioned an Infiniti EX35 crossover -- a surprisingly elegant mash of a G35 sport sedan and an FX35 SUV.

Grandiose technological pronouncements for new cars are almost routine these days, but the EX is stuffed with so much cutting-edge gadgetry that Jim Lovell could have piloted it home from orbit with no help from Houston. The standout is a how-did-they-do-that camera system that shows the entire perimeter of the car on the navigation screen when you shift into reverse. If you back up over the neighbor kid's Big Wheel, it's not the EX's fault.

Equally flashy is the lane-departure warning system, which gives a "friendly" beep when it notices you crossing a lane line. Which is fantastic if you're, say, dozing off at 75 miles per hour, putting on mascara, or attempting to tap out a text message, but migraine-inducing when you're carving deserted switchback curves. The system works like an invisible dog fence; you start driving between the lines just to avoid the penalty for straying.

That's a shame, because the EX easily qualifies for membership in the tiny band of SUVs that you can actually drive instead of just aim. At least the wicked exhaust note drowns out the warning chime when you're blasting by a rusted VW Microbus in the passing lane.