Best golf courses near Alpharetta, GA

Arthur Hills had a productive run in Atlanta from the late 1980s throug the early '90s building five new courses that set a new tone for premium golf in the city, both public and private. His marquee design was the Lakeside Course at the 36-hole Golf Club of Georgia north of the city, winner of the Best New Private Course in 1991. The lake in question is Lake Windward, which Hills used as a jagged shoreline hazard for holes 11 through 14. Another body of water, the pond in front of the 18th green, played a role in determining the outcome of several Nationwide Championships, a Senior PGA Tour event played at the course from 1995 to 2000.

The Creekside course has one of the most peripatetic routings imaginable. Peripatetic means "traveling from place to place" and that's what the course does, moving one direction through pine preserves, traveling 200 yards through the trees and emerging somewhere else, then jumping across a wetland to yet another parcel of land, and so on. Eventually you're lost. That's part of the course's mystique, the ability to turn golfers in circles and seclude them from the bustle of the surrounding north Atlanta suburbs. But there is a lot of jumping around, as in, repeatedly hitting drives and approaches over the creeks and wetlands to islands of turf and then driving around them to see where they ended up. Creekside is not for the weak player or one who struggles to get the ball airborn. Work has been done recently to create more landing space, including at the par 5 fifth that used to require a 200-yard carry to reach the fairway, and then another 200+ yard shot over wetlands to reach a small second fairway, followed by a third shot across the axis of one of the shallowest greens on the course with a ravine behind it.

Capital City Club, one of the oldest in Atlanta, opened their new Crabapple course in the far northern suburbs in 2002, and a year later it hosted the WGC American Express, won by Tiger Woods. The course sits on a vast property with no intrusion of development or homes other than the clubhouse, and though a treeless wetlands runs through the center of the course, the surrounding space gave Tom Fazio and his team room to explore. That freedom provides the course a look and playability that's distinct from almost all other courses in the market, moving in and out of different ecosystems with a minimal of hill-climbing. Crabapple excels is in this layout varietty, with holes running through pines and hardwoods and others canvassing the fields surrounding eight through ten and 15 through 18. There are split-level fairways, a drivable downhill par 4, par 3s that range from pitching wedge to long iron and a great closing trio of holes that include a reachable par 5 and two back-breaking par 4s. Though details are vague, rumor is that the entire course is going to be rebuilt soon by Fazio, including the instalation of sub-surface air systems.

Arthur Hills had a productive run in Atlanta from the late 1980s throug the early '90s building five new courses that set a new tone for premium golf in the city, both public and private. His marquee design was the Lakeside Course at the 36-hole Golf Club of Georgia north of the city, winner of the Best New Private Course in 1991. The lake in question is Lake Windward, which Hills used as a jagged shoreline hazard for holes 11 through 14. Another body of water, the pond in front of the 18th green, played a role in determining the outcome of several Nationwide Championships, a Senior PGA Tour event played at the course from 1995 to 2000.

The Creekside course has one of the most peripatetic routings imaginable. Peripatetic means "traveling from place to place" and that's what the course does, moving one direction through pine preserves, traveling 200 yards through the trees and emerging somewhere else, then jumping across a wetland to yet another parcel of land, and so on. Eventually you're lost. That's part of the course's mystique, the ability to turn golfers in circles and seclude them from the bustle of the surrounding north Atlanta suburbs. But there is a lot of jumping around, as in, repeatedly hitting drives and approaches over the creeks and wetlands to islands of turf and then driving around them to see where they ended up. Creekside is not for the weak player or one who struggles to get the ball airborn. Work has been done recently to create more landing space, including at the par 5 fifth that used to require a 200-yard carry to reach the fairway, and then another 200+ yard shot over wetlands to reach a small second fairway, followed by a third shot across the axis of one of the shallowest greens on the course with a ravine behind it.

Capital City Club, one of the oldest in Atlanta, opened their new Crabapple course in the far northern suburbs in 2002, and a year later it hosted the WGC American Express, won by Tiger Woods. The course sits on a vast property with no intrusion of development or homes other than the clubhouse, and though a treeless wetlands runs through the center of the course, the surrounding space gave Tom Fazio and his team room to explore. That freedom provides the course a look and playability that's distinct from almost all other courses in the market, moving in and out of different ecosystems with a minimal of hill-climbing. Crabapple excels is in this layout varietty, with holes running through pines and hardwoods and others canvassing the fields surrounding eight through ten and 15 through 18. There are split-level fairways, a drivable downhill par 4, par 3s that range from pitching wedge to long iron and a great closing trio of holes that include a reachable par 5 and two back-breaking par 4s. Though details are vague, rumor is that the entire course is going to be rebuilt soon by Fazio, including the instalation of sub-surface air systems.