COURSE REVIEW

From buffalo gnats
to humbling trees,
Reno-area's Golf
Club at Whitehawk
Ranch delivers

By Chris Baldwin,
Senior Writer

CLIO, Calif. (Sept. 13, 2006) - Lots of golf courses claim to be nature wonderlands. It's one of the most common and egregious misrepresentations in the industry (right up there with, "It's a course for all skill levels"). And it usually means as much as a Mel Gibson apology.

Photo gallery: Whitehawk Ranch Golf Club Be a TravelGolf.com course critic Coyote Moon's ancient granite a Sierras blast Believe it: Edgewood Tahoe a match for Pebble Beach Dayton Valley brings winds of change to Tahoe/Reno golf

There are exceptions though.

Like when you're swatting Buffalo gnats, dodging geese and gawking at hawks soaring overhead. You'll get all that and more at Whitehawk Ranch Golf Club - a course in the shadow of Lake Tahoe and Reno that's both nature and nurture.

n fact, Whitehawk has so much nature that it's liable to mess with a city liver's golf metabolism at first. Starting out getting buzzed - and bitten - by enough Buffalo gnats (think flies, only uglier and with a mean streak) that you're convinced they're trying to reenact Pearl Harbor made this golfer less than pumped for what was to come.

"Some people really have a severe reaction to them," Plumas County Visitors Bureau Director Suzi Brakken cheerfully acknowledged of the gnat bites. "But not too many."

Thanks for the confidence boost, Suzi. What's next, a swarm of locusts that are really friendly once you get to know them?

No matter. By the turn you're liable to get caught up in Whitehawk's woods. The gnats recede (or your skin gets more country-tough) and a more pleasant face of Mother Nature shows itself, one that alternates between a forest amphitheater of towering pines and wide open horizon views.

Once you get into a round here, time takes a back seat. Stash that expensive watch in your golf bag and turn off the cell phone. Using a cell on this course would be like walking into the Academy Awards in Bermuda shorts. It just wouldn't fit.

Unless perhaps you're snapping a cell phone picture of the flock of geese hanging out on No. 11. Hey, the geese know what they're doing. No. 11 is the most impressive par 3 on the course. You're shooting across a glistening blue lake with colorful flowers and swaying plants partially blocking your view from the tee (somehow, this does look natural). It's 202 yards to the flag and if you bail out right, you end up on a grassy swale that all but mocks your now-nil chances of par with a windy chuckle.

This also happens to be where a few families of geese are chilling on this day. Brakken takes so many photos of the baby geese waddling by that they must think they're Paris Hilton. The little guys are cute. Which only makes a golfer suddenly understand new consequences of a wayward iron.

Golf Club at Whitehawk Ranch 768 Whitehawk Drive Clio, CA Tee times & packages: 877-332-4465 Web: golfthehighsierra.com

"Ever kill anything on the golf course?" asks Kevin Mallory, another playing partner.

The geese survive. Any lingering notion that a golf course must be tough to entertain isn't likely to last through a Whitehawk round though.

Whitehawk doesn't lay the hammer to high handicappers. In fact, it barely lays a hard goose feather. There are a few tall grass forced carries off the tee, but nothing that is going to frustrate to even minor traffic jam degree. You can hit it around here even if you're hitting straightforward rolling shots that barely leave the ground.

Even better, Whitehawk gives you a 348-yard par 4 (No. 5) and a 310-yard par 4 (No. 9) that let average golfers really go for it. If you don't try to drive the stream on No. 9, you're probably the one person who really can drive 55 on the freeway.

The tall pines do come into play, particularly on the back nine; even the best golfer in our group found himself tromping into the woods several times, searching for wayward shots.

Just another way to get close to nature at Whitehawk Ranch. Maybe the buffalo gnats can be put to work tracking balls.

The verdict

Whitehawk Ranch is a little off the beaten path but well worth the trek. With $90 twilight rates (maybe the best time to play, with the sunset views) in prime season, this is a mid-priced course you'll want to work into a Tahoe/Reno-area trip.

Most of the courses in this High Sierra region where the temperatures are cooler and elevations higher than most West Coast golf meccas in the summer bring the scenery. But Whitehawk is almost old school, no-outward-fuss scenic.

Designer Dick Bailey didn't fall into any of the attention-grabbing traps of a celebrity architect. Probably because Bailey's not even a Surreal Life contestant's version of a celebrity. Instead Bailey let the pines, cedars and wildflowers hold center stage on this 6,927-yard par 71.

It's no little thrill to be playing holes with streams running through them. No. 17 - a 431-yard par 3 - that runs right along Sulphur Creek and has a green that buckles like a bull up on a small hill is a particular favorite.

With the late afternoon sun cutting through the tall trees, it almost feels like you're playing in a different land here. You are. It's a nature land. For real this time.

Settled in the late 1800s, the 965-acre Whitehawk Ranch property spent much of the 20th century as a working cattle ranch.

Stay and play

You barely need to leave the course to find your best room choice. The Lodge at Whitehawk Ranch (877-945-6343) is a smart accomodations pick. You rent individual condo cabins here. The one I stayed in had three full bedrooms, a huge open kitchen and dead animals everywhere on the walls. This is no wimpy trendy spot.

Dining out

If you're at Whitehawk, you're next-door to Graeagle, one of those great little towns you'd probably never stumble across if you weren't a golfer. It has six courses in an eight-mile radius, no small feat for a town with only eight residents per square mile.

Graeagle Mill Works (530-836-2828) on Highway 89, the one-lane road through town, serves some of the best pies you'll taste anywhere. Think Twin Peaks-cherry-pie good.

Moody's Bistro & Lounge (530-587-8688), about an hour away in Truckee, is arguably the place to eat in the entire Tahoe region. The manager comes straight from Manhattan gastronomic palace Picholine; the young chef wears T-shirts and cooks knockout sophisticated meals. Once a year Paul McCartney gets up on the small stage and does a show. It's that kind of place.

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.