The North course is a nice counterpoint to the South. While the South takes advantage of the ocean side location with some wonderfully scenic holes, the non ocean holes are a mix. The North course, however, throws a more varied and challenging course at you. The holes have more shape and require more strategic thinking, and although they lack the drama of holes like the South #15, they give you a better balanced golf experience. If visiting the Mauna Lani or Orchid and only time for one course I'd play the South just for the ocean views. Playing twice? Then do North and South. Playing 3 times? I'd play South once and the North twice.

Today's conditions were excellent overall. Greens play quite slow, but that seems common in Hawaii, and they weren't as slow as the South course or Mauna Kea. They are very smooth, though, with no blemishes on the greens, and roll exactly where your stroke your putt. Bunkers were excellent except for 2 where I experienced little sand over the soil (the rest were in great shape). Fairways are nearly perfect, and the rough presents a nice challenge.

Downsides? Pace of play was a little slow with a number of foursomes out ahead of me, but they moved at a pretty good pace. The range is OK but not great - balls were of so-so quality, and the practice green is faster than the real greens. And the restaurant at the course just closed, so your 19th hole requires getting in a car.

Overall I'd say the Gary Player is just average. I was surprised that it was a Troon-managed course, as it didn't seem nearly up to the standards of their other courses I've experienced.

The pro shop and restaurant buildings are smple prefab structures that resemble mobile homes stuck together. Service was good, however, with staff being very welcoming.

Driving range area is quite good, with a large tee line on grass, a very good pitching and chipping area, a separate practice bunker, and generously sized practice green. Range balls, however, were looking pretty tired.

Tee boxes were in good shape. Fairways were fairly lush, medium firm but not a lot of roll. Rough was decent, not very high and very few bad spots. Bunkers were very poor, kind of a mix of dirt and pebbly coarse sand. Many were very unkempt, not just from previous players but not smoothed well from maintenance staff. Rakes were kind of scarce - one 100 yard long fairway bunker had 2 rakes total.

Greens are in excellent condition. They were only medium speed, but were perfectly smooth with almost no ball marks. The reason, though, is they were very, very firm. Even a towering high wedge with a lot of spin would hit and bounce another club length forward, and leave no mark at all.

I thought the course layout and visual appeal was pretty boring and repetitive. Picture mostly straight holes with nearly identical houses along the sides with every fairway being kind of bowl shaped, higher on each side, and an occasional bunker to add a little visual interest. A few holes gave the player a different look, but overall it felt very repetitive. The greens were mostly flat with a tiny tilt one way or another, but almost no complex contouring at all. Pretty much every putt seemed a straight putt or maybe only a few inches of break. They rolled beautifully smooth, but not much challenge.

The course is in pretty good condition, and I know winter rates in the Valley aren't cheap, but the course felt quite overpriced for what one gets. There are much better choices around like Classic Club, Firecliffs, SilverRock, Escena, etc.

Played on Wed 2/18 with 9am tee time. Pace of play was OK at around 4:30.

Driving range was large but pretty busy and difficult to find a decent grassy lie. Range balls are ridiculously overpriced at $17 for a large bag. The balls were kind of hit or miss, with about 1/3 good balls, 1/3 mediocre, and 1/3 that should have been taken out of play long ago.

Tees are very shaggy, with long grass. It felt like one was teeing it way too low even with a long tee barely poking into soil. There were a lot of over-watered areas around the tee boxes; some were quite muddy between the cart and tee box.

Fairways are mostly good. A bit thin in spots, but few bare patches.

Greens were pretty good although it looked like they'd be recently punched with a small tine aeration tool, and the sand top dressing occasionally came into play. They were mostly smooth with occasional bumpiness. Ball mark damage wasn't too bad, although I usually fixed 3-4 unfixed marks on every green.

Bunkers were poor. Fairway bunkers had a gravel-like sand that barely covered a hard packed clay/mud foundation. Greenside bunkers had better sand but not by much, and it was very inconsistent.

Overall, the layout is OK but nothing special and has few memorable holes. All the holes have a bowl shape to the fairways (higher on each side than the middle), and that makes it seem repetitive. If one scores a good deal from UnderPar or SCGA, I'd say Oak Creek is an OK value (except for the very pricey driving range). At rack rates, it is a definite "skip".

Challenging course, great condition, fast pace, perfect service - what more can one ask for?

Played Maderas on 1/22 in the morning as a single, and was able to finish in just over 2 hours. The course is in great shape and looks fantastic with the tan dormant Bermuda rough bordering bright green fairways. Condition overall is excellent, some of the best I've seen at Maderas. Service is country club perfect, and the whole place makes you feel like you are in a nice little club. Greens were excellent, with little ball mark damage and rolled nice and true. Rack rates aren't cheap, but in the premium course category Maderas represents a good deal.

Played here Saturday 1/3. Starting with the excellent range, everything about re-opened Rams Hill is done well. Outstanding condition, great layout, uncrowded - an absolutely great golf experience and well worth the drive.

Played Wednesday 9/10 in the morning. Frankly, I'd stay away from Aviara right now, as the conditioning is the worst I've ever seen here. At the rates they charge, it is not in the shape it needs to be for the premium golf segment.

Tee boxes are in maintenance, so I won't ding them on that. The fairways are generally good, with occasional bare patches but they are pretty good overall. Sand traps are good. Where Aviara is suffering right now is the rough and the greens.

The rough is simply terrible. Major bare patches that are overwatered as the groundskeepers try and recover. If you miss the green, you're either hitting off mud or out of random tufts of deep, inconsistent grass. The greens are also struggling, with numerous bare patches and strips of repaired turf. If Aviara was offering a 50% off deal it might be OK, but at their high prices it is very disappointing. There are many area courses that are in much better shape at a quarter of the price. I had hoped that they would have improved on these problems since my July review, but it has gotten worse.

Maderas is in fantastic shape right now. Fairways are lush and green and have a decent amount of roll. Greens are smooth and roll very nicely; they aren't quite as fast as they used to run here, but they're quick enough to make putting the contours a good challenge. Staff is great as always. Overall, I'd say it is in the best shape in years, and for a place that has always been very well kept, that really means something!

Played Monday 5/21 morning. Service here is always impeccable, and the layout is fun, fair, and challenging. POP was good at just over 4 hours.

Condition was sort of spotty. Tee boxes were great and fairways were pretty good, but had numerous bare patches. The rough was getting poor in many places, with a lot of bare patches. The greens were medium speed, and showed a surprising number of pitch marks and a bit of bumpiness, plus occasional bare areas. Bunkers were very good.

The conditioning issues wouldn't be too annoying at most public courses, but they were surprising for Aviara. A couple months ago the course was in fantastic shape, so it is surprising so many issues showed up so fast. For such a high $$$ place it was fairly disappointing.

Played AB North on 7/16. Nice layout, and overall in pretty good condition.

Pace of Play: Fast (finished in just under 4 hours)
Greens: A bit slow, lots of pitch marks and spike marks, but still generally reasonably good.
Fairways: Pretty good. Generally green with good lies, although there are a lot of areas marked GUR.
Bunkers: Reasonably fluffy sand, not too many unraked footprints.
Tee Boxes: Level, not too many divots.

I like AB North, and it was good to see it in pretty good condition in the middle of drought conditions. It's a pleasant layout and good value.

From 6/25 round:

Tee boxes: excellent, relatively little divot damage
Fairways: excellent, mostly very green and lush with good lies
Rough: very good, decent length, some spots of overwatering
Sand traps: average to poor, standing water in places, sometimes very heavy sand that's more like clay
Greens: average, fairly slow and a bit inconsistent from one to another, bumpy in spots, several had damaged areas that hadn't healed well yet

Love the layout, conditions are fairly good with the exceptions noted above, and the course is a great value for the fees charged. Frankly, I'd like to see Oak Quarry alter their watering plans, especially in these drought conditions. Fairways were actually too green and lush for these conditions, and rough was overwatered in places. In my opinion they should let the fairways go firmer and not so green, ignore the rough in areas that are way out of play, and focus their maintenance efforts more on keeping outstanding greens. I think the course would be more fun and look great, and probably cut their maintenance costs considerably.

Played 6/16 with late morning tee time. Pace was slow at 5 hours. Per my earlier review the course is in nice lush shape now, but the greens aren't rolling as nice - they're slow to medium speed, fairly bumpy and still show the waffle pattern from aeration well over a month ago. They really need to roll them to get them smooth again; playing two weeks ago they rolled much nicer and more true.

Played in the SCGA outing, and although Pelican Hill is generally a nice course, I'd be absolutely furious if I were a hotel guest and paid the rack rate. The conditions weren't nearly as good as when I last played PH. Many greens had some repaired areas along with spots where they were verticut but no top dressing. Fairways were mostly OK although there were quite a few areas that were brown and thin, and these weren't just from water conservation as some spots were severely overwatered. Many bunkers were unraked and filled with footprints, and quite a few had the cloth lining poking up through the sand throughout the bunker. The laser rangefinder provided with the cart didn't work. All of these things aren't unreasonable on an average course, but for a facility that presents itself as a high end luxury experience and has the priciest greens fees in SoCal, it is unacceptable.