Looking for some sun on the Peninsula, I headed inland and played Carmel Valley Ranch on a picture perfect day. I often forget about this great course and don’t know why. It’s a spectacular track. ... Continue »

Looking for some sun on the Peninsula, I headed inland and played Carmel Valley Ranch on a picture perfect day. I often forget about this great course and don’t know why. It’s a spectacular track. I played 36, once from the brown tee’s and once from the orange. The course was super quiet and I felt like I had the place to myself except for about a 4 hole stretch where I ran into a grandmother and her grandson who seemed to be oblivious that there was actually someone else on the course!

Condition wise the entire place is just short of a 10! In fact one could easily justify rating it at a 10. The greens were awesome. The rolled super smooth at a nice fast pace. It was a pleasure to play on greens that rolled fast like this. The best part was that the greens kept a consistent pace throughout the entire day/course. The only reason I didn’t rate the greens a 10 was that they were a tad firm on approach shots.

Fairways were in that 9.5-10 range and I gave them a 10. Fairways were nice and lush and emerald green throughout. There was one fairway that was damp and swallowed up tee shots preventing any rollout. Other than that, Perfect.

Tee boxes were perfect. Level, lush, very few divots (which were filled in with sand). Sand boxes had high quality sand. Rough was very manageable. Yes this is a resort course and plays like such, but it’s a gem with water hazards on the front nine and elevation changes on the back. I need to put in on my rotation more often!