Desert Delight Golf Course Near Wenatchee Offers Stunning Scenery Plus An Unusual And Challenging Round For Golfers Of All Abilities

Golfers didn’t use to expect too much from golf courses.

You hit the ball, you muttered to yourself, you hit it again.

Difficulty varied to some degree, certainly, but you pretty much knew what you’d find. Trees and traps, sometimes water. Eighteen fairly uniform greens.

Today, though, much of the focus is attached to the golf “experience” - the features that make one course different from the rest.

The Coeur d’Alene Resort has a stunningly maintained layout, for instance, but what people talk about most is its unique floating green.

At Apple Tree in Yakima, an island green has been carved into the shape of an apple.

What’s next? Will Walla Walla have a green shaped like a sweet onion? Will Olympia have a big, round green shaped in the outline of Gov. Mike Lowry?

One concern is that the game will become trivialized if gimmicks overpower substance. However, the folks at Desert Canyon Golf Resort near Wenatchee have created an interesting course that is not only unusual, but a true golf challenge.

Through the combined wonders of irrigation and imagination, they brought Arizona-style target golf to the desert of Central Washington.

This is not just a gimmick. Desert Canyon was named by Golf Digest magazine as the second-best course in Washington, behind only Sahalee in Redmond.

Consider this a rare honor for a course only two years in existence.

“I love it here; I’ve been involved with seven courses but nothing quite like this,” said golf director Jack Frei, who designed and built the course. He also designed the highly regarded courses McCormick Woods, Echo Falls and Bear Creek.

Frei concedes that the quick recognition of Desert Canyon has surprised even him, to a degree. “We were fortunate to have the Northwest Open here and we got a lot of attention from the pros who went back to members and said, ‘Hey, you’ve got to go play this course,”’ Frei said.

Some pros have raved about the course - not quite a 3-hour drive from Spokane - since its opening.

“It’s one of my favorite courses,” said Sun Dance pro Chris Mitchell. “It’s target golf with a great layout.”

Certainly, the expense of routing irrigation up onto the slopes above the Columbia River canyon would seem to preclude the establishment of a water-guzzling golf course.

That’s where the first bit of good fortune arose. The site originally was intended to be an orchard.

The state of Washington organized a number of farmers into an irrigation district and helped fund the construction of an irrigation system.

“But with the Alar scare in ‘84, they all went broke and defaulted their bonds, leaving the state holding the property,” Frei said. “It sat there seven or eight years.”

About the same time, Frei was going to Arizona when target-style courses - featuring plush landing areas amid the desert - were springing up in the Phoenix area. “They were very popular, and when I saw this site, I could tell that this would give us an opportunity to do something very unique in the state of Washington,” Frei said. “Washington has some great courses, but nothing like this.”

The vista from the bluffs above the river also provides scenery that the desert courses in the Southwest can’t touch, Frei pointed out.

The area receives only 8 inches of annual rainfall, but the ryegrass blends used on the fairways have rooted spectacularly in the sandy-loamy soil.

“The thing people really seem to notice is the quality of the grass. The ball sits up so nice,” Frei said. “And our greens are double-sized so we can move the pins around quite a bit so they don’t get damaged from play.”

As is the case with other target-golf courses, this is not a layout in which you can wail away with the driver off every tee. In some cases, a middle-iron is called for.

And although the desert is everywhere, it is not particularly punitive. Out-of-bounds is involved in very few cases, meaning that if you can find your ball between the scattered sagebrush, you can play it. “Actually, we have probably another 50 or 60 feet outside of the fairways where you can still easily find your ball and play it,” Frei said. “We probably have 40 acres of more playable area than most courses.”

That can require some precautions. Steve Kelley, a real estate agent handling sales of the on-site villas, says he always takes a club when he wanders off to find his ball in the scablands, since bull snakes - which enjoy doing rattlesnake impersonations - are seen occasionally.

Assistant pro Steve Stensland says no golfers have had a run-in with a rattler, yet, although members of the maintenance crew have discovered a few.

This course is such a marvelous challenge, though, that even a few reptiles should not be considered more than a slithering lateral hazard.

It is divided into two nines, the Lakes nine and Desert nine. Both are stunning and both play to roughly 3,400 yards from the blue tees.

The No. 1 holes run parallel downhill, divided by a set of waterfalls. The holes share one giant, continuous green, a theory thieved from St. Andrews, Scotland.

Desert Canyon’s signature hole is memorable and scenic, but not for the weak-kneed. No. 6 on the Desert nine, a par-5, stretches a whopping 658 yards from the blue tees and offers spectacular views of the river gorge.

Desert No. 9 is another that will test the driver and long irons; the par-4 measures 490 yards from the blues.

“We knew that men would come and appreciate the course,” Frei said. “But we really wanted women golfers to come and enjoy it, too, and we’ve had very good response from them. We hear of ladies shooting six or seven strokes lower than at their home clubs because the fairways are so wide and the ball sits up so well.”

On two holes, where long carries across canyons are necessary, there are separate greens so that women can play short of the chasms if they choose.

The course has a blemish, though. Power lines coming up from the canyon run on a tangent to the south end of the layout. On one hole, you can hear them sizzling above. High-tension wires above the course would not have been Frei’s first choice, but “I think we did a pretty good job of working around them,” he said.

The other quibble is that a player really needs to golf with someone who has played the course before. Maps with helpful hints are provided, but without more guidance, some serious misclubbing could wreck a round.

The in-season rates for a round are reasonable for a resort course, at $50 Monday through Thursday and $55 Friday through Sunday. The best buy in the state might be the twilight rates at $28. All those rates include rental of a power cart.

Brand-new villas adjacent to the Lakes No. 9 fairway are available for rent at reasonable package rates. Some villas include digital satellite TV, VCRs (so you can watch “Caddyshack” when not playing), and full kitchens.

In keeping with Frei’s goal of making this resort a place the entire family can enjoy, Desert Canyon features an elaborate 18-hole putting course.

Lakes, waterfalls, traps, double doglegs and severe slopes test putters on this par-70, 2,561-foot layout.

If you’re driving the family over to Seattle via Route 2, this might be a great place to stop for a break and a few hours of fun. Generally, it takes 1-1/2 hours to complete a round at the putting course. Rates are $8 for adults and $6 for kids (12 and under).

“What we really wanted to try to do is make sure people have fun out here,” Frei said.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: IF YOU GO

Location 170 miles west of Spokane, 25 miles north of Wenatchee on Highway 97.

Season Roughly March through the middle of November.

Rates 18 holes in-season (May 16 through Oct. 15), $50 on Monday through Thursday, $55 on Friday through Saturday. Twilight rates: $28. Eighteen holes off-season (Oct. 16 through May 15), $27 Monday and Tuesday, $35 Wednesday and Thursday, $45 Friday through Sunday. All rates include cart. Tee times are taken seven days in advance. Rates for 18-hole putting course: $8 for adults, $6 for children 12 and under.

Accommodations On-site villas, two- and three-bedrooms. Stay-and-play packages for two-bedroom villas start at $98 per person, based on double occupancy. Packages for three couples in three-bedroom villas start at $76 per person, with six occupants. For information, call 800-560-7829.

Amenities Oasis Cafe, a full-service on-site restaurant. Jim McLean Golf Schools. Various clinics and private lessons from J.D. Cline, director of instruction.