COURSE REVIEW

Prehistoric golf
theater: Coyote Moon
Golf Course's ancient
granite a Sierra blast

By Chris Baldwin,
Senior Writer

TRUCKEE, Calif. (July 25, 2006) - It looks like something straight out of a prehistoric theater, golf on Stonehenge. Hulking rocks surround the green in a seemingly random, perfect harmony. Each stone appears larger than the next. The one right behind the flag, looming over and into a white sand bunker, is big enough to swallow that Indian Jones bunker from 80s movie lore.

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It's such an arresting visual of a hole that golfers often stop back in the Coyote Moon Golf Course clubhouse to compliment the work it must have required. That 12th hole ... what kind of heavy machinery did it take?

"People usually ask how we moved all those big rocks," Head Professional Dirk Skillicorn said, laughing.

Think again. There are limits to even modern golf-course architecture. The monster rocks at Coyote Moon date back centuries. They were here long before the first white man set foot in the California/Nevada High Sierra. They were here before golf was a sport, or even a thought.

Some much more original designer came up with these things.

Which doesn't mean that Brad Bell doesn't deserve credit for incorporating the granite outcroppings into Coyote Moon's layout. A lot of course architects might have shied away from these hulking blocks, seen them as an impediment to their vision. Bell, an obscure former PGA Tour pro turned neophyte designer, built holes around the giants, using them to full dramatic effect.

Holes like No. 12 and it’s Stonehenge green. And No. 7, the par 5 where the granite outcroppings make their first appearance. It’s often a startling - breakout the HBO Deadwood vocabulary - one for Coyote Moon first timers going for the green in two. For missing right here on approach can send your ball thudding off a boulder so big it’s been named (Hooligan’s Rock).

"You wouldn't want to run into this thing in a dark alley," local golfer Larry Wilson quipped as he putted out on No. 7 with Hooligan's lurking over his shoulder.

This is just part of the natural wonder at Coyote Moon, arguably the best golf course you've never heard of. Oh, it got some nice word of mouth after its summer-2000 opening. But it's still a largely underrated track in an equally overshadowed region where the elevation's higher and the temperatures cooler than many West Coast golf meccas in the summer.

Coyote Moon Golf Course 10685 Northwoods Blvd. Truckee, CA Tee times and packages: 877-332-4465 Web: golfthehighsierra.com

"We'd heard a little about it because we're from Napa area," visiting golfer Mike Cameron said. "But one of our buddies who flew in from Denver for the trip was like, 'What's a Coyote Moon?'"

Just a course where the pine trees are towering, the up-and-downs plentiful and the houses nil. That's right, Coyote Moon is a golf course built in the 21st century without an on-site real-estate component. A round takes you weaving through the woods, with no chance of stumbling across someone's garden gnome.

"It’s almost unheard of in golf today," Skillicorn said of the no homes.

It produces a course with a completely different feel, one where scenery becomes more than a standard, rote word in golf course brochure. Staring across a chasm of trees and rocks, down at a green that looks to be no short elevator ride from the tee on No. 13, you cannot help but think that Coyote Moon’s been cut out of a mountain.

And you’d better think here. For this 227-yard par 3 plays havoc with club selection as you wrestle with a hole that looks so darn imposing and yet plays shorter with the severe downhill. That’s an 180 foot drop from the tee.

Coyote Moon has a back nine that tests your nerve in the wilderness. No Boy Scout survival skills merit badge is going to prepare you for it either. There’s an annoying 601-yard par 5 (No. 15) that climbs uphill and gives even longer hitters no chance to make the green in two and ordinary ones hardly anything to shoot at period. There’s a long water clear par 3 (No. 16) and a inventive par 4 that just dares and double dares you to cut the corner on the lake (No. 17).

So much for getting bored in the woods.

The verdict

It's hard to call a course most people haven't heard of, by an architect most people haven't heard of, in a little town in Tahoe's shadow a must-play. But you know what? Coyote Moon is as close as you can get to one.

It tops its Nicklaus-designed neighbor, Old Greenwood Golf Course, in almost every way. And Old Greenwood is a nice course. Coyote Moon is just that good, this reviewer's second favorite among a packed selection of Lake Tahoe/Reno plays (after only the renowned Edgewood Tahoe).

Some golfers look at Coyote Moon's $150 green fee and blanch. Play it and you'll lose any price-tag quibbles. From the first hole, a par 5 that lets you bomb away (as long as you avoid the tree in the fairway), you'll be into it. Everyone seems to be at Coyote Moon. Even the beer-cart girl. She made so many runs in her high-tech cart that you thought she was being paid by the lap.

She could talk prehistoric rocks too.

Stay and play

There used to be a lot more chunks of granite in the Reno-Lake Tahoe region. Tons of it was blasted away to make way for the Transcontinental Railroad.

Truckee is a great base for a Sierra golf trip. This riverside town has tons of character along with surprisingly hip restaurants and shops. The Hampton Inn here is unlike any Hampton Inn you've ever stayed in - big suites, a distinctive exterior and a staff that goes out of its way to please.

Dining out

Moody's Bistro & Lounge (530-587-8688) is the place to eat in Truckee and maybe the entire Tahoe region. The manager comes straight from Manhattan gastronomic palace Picholine and a young chef wears T-shirts and cooks knockout sophisticated meals. This is where Paul McCartney gets up on the small stage and sings once a year. It's that good.

Any opinions expressed above are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of the management. The information in this story was accurate at the time of publication. All contact information, directions and prices should be confirmed directly with the golf course or resort before making reservations and/or travel plans.