An enjoyable Southern golf trek included a four-day visit to the Gulf Shores, Alabama area
on the Gulf of Mexico coast. Once a quick stop for truckers and other nomads, the former hamlet
of Gulf Shores is now a family-style vacation resort - a miniature Ocean City without all the highrises.
Kiva Dunes
Kiva Dunes' Hole 1
Because of this change in demographics and travel patterns, a number of leading golf
courses have been built in
Gulf Shores.
At the top of the list is
Kiva Dunes, named
Golf Digest's No. 2 best new public course for 1995 and one of the top 75 upscale courses in the
U.S. It is also named Alabama's top public course.
A Jerry Pate creation, Kiva Dunes was constructed entirely on sand dunes on a thin strip of land separating
Mobile Bay and the Gulf. Adjacent to a wildlife refuge, the course was designed for all levels of play,
and it is a real test from the back at nearly 7,092 yards. Fickle ocean winds make this course doubly
challenging. Earlier this year, a group of Nike Tour players came here to practice and said it was the
best conditioned course they had ever played.
Kiva is one of the best conditioned courses you'll ever play. Its tifdwarf greens are outstanding and the
Bermuda 419 fairways are overseeded in the fall with rye, presenting different playing characteristics
in the winter versus the summer. Because of the almost daily winds that can kick up to 25 knots and
more, all but the longest hitters should stay away from the tips and play from the blues (6,500).
Cotton Creek, The Woodlands, and others
Cotton Creek - Photo by Colette Boehm
The Gulf Shores area also boasts a number of other outstanding layouts including Peninsula, Rock Creek,
and Timber Creek all designed by Alabama native son Earl Stone;
Cotton Creek, a
27-hole Arnold Palmer design; and The Woodlands, a 6,400-yard lake-dotted course created by PGA player
Larry Nelson that includes a fairway with two oak trees smack in the middle.
Six short miles from Kiva Dunes, Peninsula is a development course with a strong front nine and coastal features.
Rock Creek
in nearby
Fairhope,
about a 25-minute drive
from Gulf Shores, is an outstanding course, offering elevation changes atypical of this area. With a 73.8 rating
and a 144 slope,
Timber Creek
off I-10 near Mobile Bay may be the supremist test on the Alabama coast. Cotton Creek on Hwy 59 just minutes from
Gulf Shores is scenic and more forgiving than Kiva Dunes. Cotton Creek, Peninsula, Rock Creek,
Glenlakes
and The
Woodlands are fun courses that might well appeal to the more casual golfer.
Lost Key and Perdido Bay
Hole 3 - Kiva Dunes
Finally, if you like very tight courses, try Lost Key, a 6,800-yard tester also designed by Arnold
Palmer on Perdido Key in the Florida panhandle, just 25 minutes from Gulf Shores. A very well
maintained course on sensitive wildlife terrain including very narrow landing areas and plenty of
marshes, it recently was awarded Audubon International's signature status.
And though I didn't get to play it on this trip, another course I have put on my "to play" list and
which should be on yours too, is
Perdido Bay
in nearby Pensacola,
Florida, site of the former
Pensacola Open. 
