Overview: Buffalo Ridge Springs Course is one of 5 golf courses located at Big Cedar Lodge (which overlooks Table Rock Lake in the Ozark Mountains just south of Branson, Missouri.) Buffalo Ridge was ...
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Overview: Buffalo Ridge Springs Course is one of 5 golf courses located at Big Cedar Lodge (which overlooks Table Rock Lake in the Ozark Mountains just south of Branson, Missouri.) Buffalo Ridge was designed by Tom Fazio in 1999, but about 5 years ago Johnny Morris the founder and owner of Bass Pro Shops and Big Cedar Lodge asked Mr Fazio to come back and do a $20 million dollar renovation of Buffalo Ridge. The renovation included adding new approaches, water features and bunker renovations. Mr Morris and Mr Fazio have also re-designed the course layout so as to bring players in close contact with nature, native grasses and free ranging Buffalo on the nearby Dogwood Canyon Nature Park.
Clubhouse: A small but beautiful clubhouse with the pro shop, a small bar and sitting area. The outside patio has tables and chairs set up so as to have beautiful views of the Ozark Mountains, 1st hole and practice area to the north and views of Dogwood Canyon Nature Park and Buffalo to the west.
Course: One of the best course designs that I have every played. Hole #1 is a beautiful slight dogleg to the left downhill par 5 and from there every hole seems to get better. Holes 2 - 4 are very good holes, but once you hit hole number #5 every hole is almost a "wow" hole. The course continues to get better on the back nine, and the back nine is probably one of my favorite nines that I have had an opportunity to play. Holes #14 and #15 were probably my favorite.
While the course design was tremendous the playing conditions were just as good. Buffalo Ridge has bentgrass greens and they were in great shape ... they looked great, rolled true and ran at a medium speed and were a little bit soft due to the heat and humidity while we were there, but that was to be understood because you have to have a lot of water on bentgrass greens when the temperatures are in the mid to high 90's and the humidity is high ... as it was all 5 days that we were at Big Cedar Lodge. One of the greens even had a huge fan blowing on it. The rough was 2 inches in length and was a half stroke penalty if you hit it in there. The white Augusta like sand was of great quality and was very easy to hit from. My favorite part of the course though was the Zoysia fairways ... they were perfect. I have played on Zoysia fairways once before, and I love how the ball sits up on it like it's on a tee. There are basically no bad lies on Zoysia fairways.
Final Thoughts: Buffalo Ridge is one of 5 courses at Big Cedar Lodge ... 3 of them are regulation 18 hole courses and the other 2 are par 3 courses. Johnny Morris (the owner of Big Cedar Lodge and Bass Pro Shops) is trying to make Big Cedar Lodge "as America's next great golf destination". One of my favorite experiences about playing golf here was the opportunity to see Buffalo roaming the plains of the Ozarks Mountains.
