A trip worth waiting fore
In North Carolina, a visit to ‘the cradle of American golf’
Every friend group has a planner. Ours was John. For years, he organized golf trips for a group of four avid players. In early 2020, he began to orchestrate a longdiscussed a bucket-list trip: Six days in Pinehurst, North Carolina, a world-renowned golf destination that may have more good golf courses within a 15-mile radius than anywhere in the world.
We were originally scheduled to go in May, and then again in early October, but the pandemic forced us to cancel both times. Finally, John rescheduled our trip for April 2021. He died in late October.
After some soul-searching, we decided to honor his memory by going. And when the first of our two caddies introduced himself as John Ross on the first tee of Pinehurst No. 2 — our friend’s given name was Ross John — it seemed meant to be.
We had chosen Pinehurst because of another Ross, famed golf course designer Donald Ross. Born in Scotland, Ross came to Pinehurst in 1900 at the behest of its founder, Bostonian soda fountain magnate James Walker Tufts. Donald Ross designed the first four courses at the Pinehurst Resort, including Pinehurst No. 2, arguably the best known of the approximately 400 courses he created.
Pinehurst No. 2 has hosted more golf championships than any other American course. What makes it so special are Ross’s trademark crowned, or turtleback, greens, which repel all but the best shots off the putting surface and into collection areas; this can leave diabolical recovery chips or putts to an uphill green that often return to where the previous shot started.
Still, the course was a high point of our vacation. My goal was to play as many top courses in the Pinehurst area as we could, and we ended up playing 11 during our six-day stay. This part of central North Carolina is known as the Sandhills, a result of ancient sand dunes formed by the receding oceans from thousands of years before. The result is sandy soil ideal for golf courses, one reason there are more than 40 in the area.
The first official day of our trip had us playing the sister courses Pine Needles and Mid Pines, both designed by Ross in the 1920s and both in Golf Digest’s list of top 25 courses in North Carolina. We quickly got a sense for what we were in for the rest of the week — challenging and very fast greens, plenty of sandy waste areas, longleaf pines framing most holes and a feeling of being transported back to an earlier, simpler time. From hitting balls on the Pine Needles’ pristine driving range at 7 a.m. to finishing our 36th hole of the day on the 18th at Mid Pines with the beautiful backdrop of the century old, Georgian-style Inn at Mid Pines, it was a great way to begin.
The next day’s first course, Dormie Club, was scheduled to turn private just days after we played it, and we felt like members for the day at the pristine and beautiful course. The same could not be said for our afternoon round. Tobacco Road in nearby Sanford, North Carolina, is a course you have to see, and experience, to believe. Designer Mike Strantz combined his two passions, art and golf, to create an extreme, visually striking and intense course that is the polar opposite of the minimalist Ross-designed courses.
Consider the first hole: Players have to hit between two 40-foot high man-made hills to reach the fairway. There are more sandy waste areas here than on any course I’ve ever seen. This is a course you’re going to feel strongly about one way or the other. I’m glad we tried it, but was happy to get on more familiar — and level — footing the next day.
From there it was on to the Pinehurst Resort. We started with Pinehurst No. 1, the first course built at Pinehurst and another Ross design, before playing No. 9, a Jack Nicklaus layout, in the afternoon. Both were good courses, but we were thinking ahead to playing Pinehurst No. 2 the next morning.
Our Pinehurst No. 2 caddies John, who is 80 and has been caddying at Pinehurst since he was 13, and 25-year-old Derek, did much more than carry our bags (no carts are allowed on No. 2) and read our putts. John told us his first tip at Pinehurst, in 1954, was a nickel (Pinehurst Resort recommended we tip each caddie a minimum of $40, on top of a caddie fee of $65, which was money well spent), and Derek told us his biggest tip was $600. “That guy was a freaking unicorn,” he said with a smile.
Despite the storied challenge of the greens, No. 2 was very playable. A cool feature to know is that Pinehurst gives anyone who gets a 2 on any hole on No. 2 a commemorative coin. We came close several times, but did not succeed.
We relived our No. 2 adventure immediately after with lunch at the Deuce, a casual, pub-style eatery whose outdoor seating overlooks the 18th green. After lunch, I spent time touring the Pinehurst Resort clubhouse, which resembles a golf museum, complete with a gift shop. The display that caught my attention featured charismatic Payne Stewart, winner of the 1999 U.S. Open played at No. 2.
Stewart, who died in a plane crash in October of that year, is a larger-than-life presence at Pinehurst thanks to the bronze statue of his dramatic fist-pump celebration on the 18th green that sits 50 yards from that spot.
My friend Greg and I then went to play the Cradle, Pinehurst’s nine-hole short course just a few steps from the clubhouse. So named because Pinehurst is considered the home, or cradle, of American golf, the Cradle had a relaxed, laidback vibe. Music was piped onto the course, and drinks were available at the vintage beverage cart located nearby.
We reserved caddies again the next morning for playing Pinehurst No. 4. Caddie Greg Tew, whom I had requested in advance on a friend’s recommendation, was friendly, knowledgeable and unfailingly positive. It was our conversation on the 14th tee — a long par 3 with water in front and left of the green, with the pin on the left side — and what happened next that I will always remember.
When handing me my 5-iron, Greg said, “We’ve been talking about holes in one, but this is not the place for that.” He said to hit it well right of the hole, my best chance to avoid the water. I hit my best shot of the day, which started right but kept moving left. The ball ended up about 10 feet from the cup. Greg broke into a big laugh and gave me a fist bump.
That afternoon we played Pinehurst No. 7 in the rain, the only bad weather we encountered. But we ended our trip on a brighter note with a Sunday-morning round at Pinehurst No. 8. Known as the Centennial for opening 100 years after Pinehurst’s founding in 1895, it deserves its billing as one of the Pinehurst’s best three tracks, with No. 2 and No. 4, and is the most underrated.
It was the golf trip of a lifetime, just as John planned, and more than once we toasted the memory of our absent friend, knowing he would have enjoyed every minute of it.