I played here in the afternoon of 5/17 as a walk on single and got paired with a couple of out of towners. We had a great round. I've played here seveal times and I love the coruse. You may want to consider investing in their players card. For $300 you get a "complimentary" round and 50% off on their regular rates. I'm sure that once you play the course you'll want to come back often.

I played from the blue tees, but the fairways were rolling hard and fast, so it seemed shorter than the posted 6654 yards. If you're familiar with other Johnny Miller designs, you'll find a lot of risk / reward opportunities. Pay attention to the wind and the slope of teh hilly fairways as you can hit a solid shot but be disappointed with the result. Example - Hole # 5 is a long downhill (460 yds) par 4. The wind will usually push your ball from right to left. Either hit a fade into the wind or aim at the forward aiming post and watch your ball move left and roll nicely down the hill. Don't be surprised if your 250 yard normal drive doesn't roll to 280 or 300 yards down the hill. Be prepared for a downhill lie on you second shot and be mindful of where you land your ball on the green. I landed my ball in front of the green rolled to 5 feet of the pin....but on the other side of a berm and my ball rolled to the back of the green.

Anyhow, the fairways were in great shape, however, it would be nice if more of the golfers filled their divots. The greens were also in good shape. you could see that they had been punched several weeks earler, but they still rolled true, but slower than normal.

I highly recommend the course

Played the Vineyard on Sunday 11/5 at 6:30 AM. Well, this is my first time back to the Vineyard in almost a year. I had sworn off this course after repeated outings when the rounds took 5 - 6 hours to complete. We went our at 6:30 am and were the 4th group out. I'm pleased that play took 4:10 minutes. However, by the time we finished our round there were people making the turn and coming in and complaining about the slow play. The course seems very poplular with Asian tourists, many who seem relatively new to golf - not sure if this what contributes to the slow play, the course layout, or Sunday muni players. That's enough of a rant - now the course.

One of the other reasons I swore off this course was due to the overall poor shape of the course. Well, I'm pleased to report that the course was in great shape.

Positives:
1. the tee boxes were in great condition. They were reseeded about a month ago so some of them were a little long. But more importantly, they were level and it was easy to find a nice spot in the box.
2. the fairways were in great shape. The rye grass has come in beautifully and it was very full.
3. the greens were in great condition. Theycould have used a quick mow, but the Poanna rolled very true, but just a touch on the slow side. The crew, or the golfers did a good job of repairing ball marks.

Negatives:
1. the rough was extremely high - I'm talking US Open high. Shots off the fairway were sometimes very difficult to find. Everyone in our group had at least one lost ball in the rough. At the end of our round I asked the guys in the clubhouse about it and they explained that their 2 rough mowers have been down for several days.

2. the bunkers were inconsistent from hole to hole. It was obvious that they have tried to "fluff" the sand, but some bunkers were pretty thin.

All in all, I wouldn't let these minor negatives keep you away. However, I would strongly suggest you get up early and snatch one of the first 5 or 6 tee times - nothing later than 7:00 am.

Played at 6:18 am on Saturday 11/4. Course is back to its old great shape. The course took a beating over the summer but I'm pleased to report that the fairways and greens were in great shape. The rough was a little high for us weekend hackers, but I'm sure they have been letting the rye overseeding come in.

Staff is very friendly with one minor exception, the boys at the cart barn when you drop off your cart were very slow to help unloan our bag or clean up the clubs. I guess they don't need tips up there in Oceanside.

We were second group out so it's no great surprise that the pace of play was great. Our 4some finished in just a little over 4 hours. I like the rcourse very much, but I would like to see them rework a couple of holes. We play from the tips, and it wouldn't take much to make the 469 yard #16 a par 5 so we could end up with a par 72 course.

The course is still on my "recommended" list.

Played Oak and Stonehouse on 10/22. The greens on the Oaks side were punched the previous week and the fairway overseeding was only starting to sprout. Consequently, there were a lot of bare spots on the fairways. The Oaks greens really needed more top dressing as the punchmarks were really deep. Needless to say, this made for some tough putting. The Oaks lay out is unique, there is a mix of shorter par 4, one longer par 3s and some really long par 4s and great par 5s. The fairways on the Stonehouse 9, were in full bloom. The overseeding made it feel like you were playing out of the light rough. So you can imagine what the rough looked like - US Open style rough - really deep. They really need to go ahead and mow it. The greens on Stonehouse were punched 3 weeks ago and they look great. It was tough to adjust to the speed of the greens after coming off of the Oaks greens.

We teed off at 6:40 am. The staff in the morning overlooked the 27% discount that was being extended to JC Resorts members. This was remedied when we completed our round and the management quickly credited the difference and apologized for the inconvenience.

The greens on Creek 9 were punched this week and the greens were overseeded last week. so, you might want to hold off awhile if all you can get out on is the Creek and Oak 9s.

The snack bar at this quality resort is very disappointing. I suppose they are trying to encourage you to dine in the restaurant.

Played here on 10/14. The course was in pretty good shape. The greens were a little bumpy and shaggy as they were going to be punched the following week. The fairways were not very lush as they were only recently overseeded. Regardless, this is a great course to play. It was the first time for my foursome. Consequently, several people wanted to play from the white tees. Unfortunately, these tees seemed to bring a lot of trouble into play for me. I was blasting the ball over the fairway bunkers, only to find a landing area that was 10 yards wide, or water, or brush. I would have had a much better round from the blue tees.

The tract is beautiful. The quarry setting is truely unique. I loved juat about every hole. The downhill par 3 with the water to the left is absolutely beautiful. The pin placements were very tough this particular day. This, also contributed to my 90 which is about 5 strokes over my average. I wouldn't let these nit picky comments deter you from heading out to Oak Quarry. The staff was great and the food at the clubhouse was just as good as the golf course.

I strongly recommend this course. I know I'll make the 90 mile drive from San Diego County to take in the beauty of Oak Quarry.

Played at 7:00 am on 10/8 (sunday). Pace of play was great. We were 4th off and everyone was making great time. There is no GPS on the carts any longer, which is just as well given how unaccurate they used to be. It's tough to find distance markers, so I suggest you bring a range finder.

The fairways have been thatched and overseeded and the rye is still not fully in. So, you will find yourseld with some bad lies on hard pan. The aprons around the green are pretty rough, but the greens were in very good condition. They will begin punching the greens over the next 2 weeks. I imagine that by the time the greens recover, the fairways should be back in pretty good shape.

Got out at 6:00 am on 6/4 and played Oak and Stonehouse. As others have posted, this is the premier set of 9's to play. As none of us had been out here in years, we opted to play the white tees, which were sufficiently challenging. The course was in fantastic condition. I believe this course is only a slight notch below the Arrowood Course as far as the quality goes for JC Resorts managed courses. The fairways were a bit wet and soggy at 6:00 am, but they were still in very good conditions. The greens were in excellent shape - they rolled true and were very receptive. They were a little slow in the morning, but by 8:30 the dew was off of them and they were sneaky fast.

The Oak course played pretty easy. The Stonehouse 9 is narrower, but it seemed to play a bit shorter. I would highly recommend the course and i expect to play here regularly.

Played here from the Blues (6100 yards) on Sunday 5/24. Things got off to a bad start. After calling twice earlier in the week to confirm the tee times for our 3 foursomes, we were shocked to arrive at 7:00 on Sunday morning to be told that they didn't have any of our 3 groups on the tee time.

In spite of the bad start the frazzled starter did a great job. He sent us out on the back and staggered some of the later starts off off the front and things worked out great. We came around on 18 and he was able to work us right back in on number 1. We didn't miss a beat. So kudos to great service in spite of the initial screw up.

As for the track, it was in great shape. It had some of the best looking fairways I've seen for a course in this price range. We paid $65 on a holiday Sunday. The only exception to the fairways was number 17 which seemed a little dry. The greens were in great shape - not too fast and not too slow. They were reasonably receptive. Best of all they were mowed that morning and they rolled very true (28 putts for me that day). You do have to be careful with your driver, but from the blues it's not so long as to require driver.

Well, I played here in January and posted that the course was in pretty good shape. Pumphrey posted in March that the course was looking a little rough. I played there 6/1/06 on a Thursday afternoon and I'm afraid to say the course hasn't gotten any better. The tee boxes were pretty chewed up, the greens were pretty pock marked, bumpy and slow. The fairways were overwatered on some holes (1, 10, 15) and dry and hardpan on others. The rough was in bad shape - thick fescue grass in some places, crab grass and bermuda grass in others.

This is supposed to be JC resorts premier course - I'm afraid to say it is no gem. Twilight rate was $40, whereas Mt. Woodson is only $35 and Doubletree is only $29. You won't find me on this course on a Saturday or Sunday - even at the JC rate, it is overpriced.

I took advantage of a 2 for 1 coupon that they gave out at the recent match play event. I've played LaCosta several times in the past and I always came away disappointed - mainly because the quality of the course didn't stand up to the premium green fees. Normal week day rate is $195.

The North Course comes closer to meeting the expectations that come with the lofty green fees. The South course feels like a well groomed muni-course.

However, on this particualr day 5/19/06 my $95 green fees felt just right for the North course. I really enjoyed the pristine fairways, the impeccable bunkers, and fantastic greens. If not for the bad performance i had on holes 9 through 13 (+12 in 5 holes). I would have had an excellent round. Even though I shot a 93 (a disappointing round for me) I really enjoyed playing this course. I can't blame the course for my bad performance on the stretch of holes, as they weren't particularly challenging. I simply got mentally lost in the very beautiful setting. Once I got my head back in the game, I began to play well.

If you play here - insist on playing the North course.

Played here on 5/21 - first group off at 6:00 am, so no problem with the pace of play. Our fast playing 4some finished in 3:47. As others have stated, the course is in great condition. It's a pretty open track, so you have plenty of opportunity to attack the fairways off of the tee. However, severely pulled or pused balls can find trouble. The course has pretty liberal "local rule" that allows a free drop outside of the "flower beds". I must say the martials that are liberally sprinkled at various holes along the course are very helpful and are also quick to call just about any area near or adjacent to the cart path a "flower bed".

I don't feel too bad about this liberal rule, because the general characteristics of the greens, as have been repeatedly mentioned by others here, quickly take away any strokes you feel you may have gained. The greens on this day were very hard and fast - even with some morning dew on them. Several of the greens are also very large. So, while you may not bounce and roll off, you maybe faced with a 50' to 100' putt from time to time. You might as well be psychologically prepared for 2 or 3 three-putts to show up on your scorecard.

I usually don't leave playing tips, but here are a couple I'll post for this course.

Hole 6 - is a short par 4. Reachable from virtually any of the sets of tees you might play. My advice is park your ego - even if you can hit the green it is very tough to hold. With the angle from the tee, more often than not, your shot will hit hard on the green and bounce over. If that happens, and your lucky enough to find your ball (which you probably won't be) your left with a tough chip/flop with the elevated green above your head and the green sloping away from you. Unless you hit that shot perfectly, you could find the bunker on the opposite side of the green. If you decide to go for the green, remember even with the large irregularly shaped bunker in front of the green, your better off hitting out of that challenging bunker than searching for your ball if you go over. My best birdie opportunities on this hole have come from hitting my tee shot 170 - 180 yards over the right hand fairway bunker. You'll feel strange, because your tee shot will be about 60 degrees to the right of the green. If done correctly, it will leave you a short wedge to the pin.

Hole 16 - Long Par 4 - 460 yards. Even when I've managed to rip my drive 280 off the tee, I find that I'm still left with tough iron shot to the water and bunker guarded pinninsula green and I'm also trying to cope with a slight downhill / sidehill lie. Not my best shot. Once again, the only times I've parred this hole is when I lay up with a short wedge to the left side of the fairway in front of the water. This takes the bunker protecting the green out of play and will give you a great angle to attack the pin - especially if it is in the back right. The green is very large, and I'll be the first to admit that it is very satisfying to hit the green in 2 on this tough hole, but because it is very large and hard, it is really tough to get down in 2 even if you are on the green after your second shot. So - play it like a short par 5 and try to birdie it.

I played 2 rounds on 5/23/06. The first round was in the late morning. I played from the blues - only 6000 yards. "Piece of cake", I said to myself. That was until the wind kicked up. Needless to say, the course kicked my butt. The afternoon round was still tough - even though I played from whites. However, my afternoon round was 7 strokes better than the morning round.

Since I live very near by, I golf here often. The course was generally in good shape. The fairways were neatly mowed and in lush, green condition. The rough was not terribly high, but high enough to be challenging. The bunkers were in poor condition - perhaps due to the recent rain. They really need to fluff the sand or add sand to the bunkers. There is nothing more frustrating than to make a perfectly good swing in the bunker only to hit hard pay and to bounce into the ball and skull it. The greens were in pretty good shape, but they were bumpy and slower than they usually are. I think with the rain we had the night before they hadn't yet been mowed.

I still think this is a great track, one of the best in SD. It puts emphasis on shot making rather than distance. I only use driver on 5 holes. The rest of them are irons, rescues or fairway woods. If the greens had been rolling truer, it probably would have saved me 2 strokes per side. It's unfortunate because the greens here are typically in great shape.

The course is up for sale, so I'm concerned that they might start cutting corners on maintenance. I hope that won't be the case. I know that JC Resorts wants to continue managing the course, so hopefully, they won't let the condition slide downhill. So stay posted and I'll let you know, as I usually play there once a week in the summer daylight horus.