Black Butte Ranch & Three Creeks Brewing Company
You’ve got your choice of Big Meadow and Glaze Meadow at Black Butte, and the best advice is to make time for them both.
Big Meadow is a Robert Muir Graves design that flows freely among aspen groves and Ponderosa pines, never easing up with the challenges and views. From the 14th hole, take a selfie with Three-Fingered Jack in the background, then launch a majestic tee shot onto the downhill fairway.
Glaze Meadow, a John Fought design, underwent a $3.75 million renovation and re-opened in 2012. It’s fantastic. I love the short par-4 third, a dog-leg left with water right, a nice risk-reward hole.
After your round, take a 10-minute drive to Sisters; right next to the Sisters Movie House, you’ll see Three Creeks Brewing Company. Come on in and say hello to Wade Underwood, who founded Three Creeks in 2008.
If you’re fortunate enough to be there on a Wednesday, fill your growler for only $7. Or, on any other day of the week, order a Firestorm Red or Hoodoo Voodoo IPA. And keep in mind that no one does the Hoodoo Voodoo like they do.
Sunriver Resort & Sunriver Brewing Company
Here’s a can’t-go-wrong combination – three championship courses (Crosswater, Woodlands, Meadows), a par-3 course (Caldera Springs), and a putting course with a brewery smack-dab in the middle of them all. Plus, you can stay at the hotel, a condo or one of the many houses in the sprawling neighborhood. And everywhere you look, it’s kid-friendly at Sunriver, voted a top-10 family golf destination by Golf Digest.
Crosswater is top-of-the-line in every way, but my favorite is the Meadows course by the hotel, with its meandering fairways. For whatever reason, perhaps my advancing age, I enjoy the par-5 second hole the most, with views of horses grazing in a nearby pasture.
You can walk or take a 60-second drive to Sunriver Brewing Company, where head brewer Brett Thomas has won 10 national awards. Try the Fuzztail Hefeweizen or the Vicious Mosquito IPA. Or, be more adventurous and order a Rippin’ Northwest Ale, Sunriver’s newest craft beer, said to have an “amazing dank hop flavor of an IPA, but with the easy-drinking nature of a pale ale.”
Make a point, too, of visiting Sunriver’s newest location in Bend, the Galveston Pub.
Tetherow Golf Club & Deschutes Brewery
Want stunning panoramic views of Cascade peaks and a formidable challenge on a championship course? Tetherow is on every “best courses” list, with its demanding, distinctive holes in a scenic setting. Tetherow was designed by David McLay Kidd — keep an eye out for a tall red-headed Scotsman, because the designer lives in Bend.
I played there with former Cougar and NFL quarterback Drew Bledsoe, a Tetherow member, for a Cascade Golfer story three years ago. You’ll want to have your “A” game for this course; a “C” game didn’t cut it for me, and Bledsoe won $15 from me as a result.
In addition to playing the course, you can improve your game with instruction from the Tetherow Golf Academy, and stay in one of the 50 luxurious rooms at the pet-friendly Tetherow Lodge.
From there, it’s a quick drive to downtown Bend, where you’ll wash down your round with a Mirror Pond Pale Ale at the Deschutes Brewery, the largest and oldest craft brewery in the city. You’ve probably heard of Deschutes – they distribute their craft beers to 25 states and two Canadian provinces.
After the Mirror Pond, try a Red Chair NWPA, voted the best beer in the world at the World Beer Awards in England in 2010 and 2012.
Pronghorn Resort & Crux Fermentation Project
A few years ago, I had the chance to take my family to Pronghorn Resort for a story I was writing for Cascade Golfer. Every year since, my kids have begged me to go back — they still rave about our five-star accommodations (in a private, three-bedroom villa nicer than any Ritz Carlton or Four Seasons I’d ever stayed in) and the quality of the resort’s Nicklaus Course. I’m not sure they quite understand the meaning of the word, “comped.”
Our villa had three bedrooms, with a full kitchen and fire pit on the patio — villas range from one to four bedrooms, each with similar amenities and access to the Trailhead building, home to a terrific restaurant, two giant pools and a family-friendly activity center.
As I wrote at the time, the Nicklaus and Fazio courses at Pronghorn are easily in my top-five of courses I’ve played worldwide, a decent-if-I-may-say-so list, topped by Augusta National. They’re beautiful, incredibly well-conditioned, and fun to play, with unique features (like a lava tube adjacent to the Fazio’s eighth green) that make unforgettable memories.
Pronghorn’s uniqueness makes it a good pairing with Bend’s Crux Fermentation Project, whose tasting room isn’t just a part of the brewery, but its heart. The tasting room at Crux is built in the center of the building, giving beer drinkers a 360-degree view of the beer-making process. Two of my favorite features? The ability to build your own sampler tray from any of the beers on tap, and a fenced yard where your dog can hang out while you tip back a Banished Tough Love and chow down on a grilled cheese sandwich.
Jim Moore is a sports-talk show host at 710 ESPN Seattle. He also writes for 710Sports.com, SeattlePI.com and KitsapSun.com. You can reach him at jimmoorethego2guy@yahoo.com and follow him on Twitter @cougsgo.