Diamante Dunes Course This is a golf course anyone on this board would kill to play each and every day. It's versatile, fun sporty, tough with the wind up, sexy and charming. I had the good fortune to play it under a variety of conditions and can fairly say it is the undisputed King of the Carribbean and Mexico. Set amidst towering seaside dunes, if not for the pasapalum turf and the adjacent turquoise blue water, it would be easy to mistake this for Baiting Hollow, Portrush, or Mullen. DL III was given one of natures finest raw canvases from which to work and he did a marvelous job.
The first hole shares a set of tee boxes with a viewing audience (ala Rivieria, Merion, Bel-Air) and takes you out with a "gentle handshake" par 5. No complaint by me for the next six get sequentially, and almost exponentially, more fun and beautiful.
#2, reveals the very special nature of the place. It's a longish single-shotter (201-229yd) longish single-shorter to a generously large redan-like green. The green is charmingly pocketed inside a massive dune yet mercifully allows for a ground-game approach if one chooses to make that play. After my first day cherry was popped, I'd find myself excited to see it before even arriving at the first tee.
#3 was the modern iteration of a classic Ross or Tilly mid-four with the tee's offset to a fairway offset and beneath the green. Like #18 at Seminole, you bite off as much as you wish to capture the right distance and angle for almost blind sharply uphill approach. A smattering of bunkers beneath the hole on the hillside force the player to measure their trajectory and instance accordingly. Like most every green out here, it's fairly large and surrounded with closely mown chipping buffers.
#4 is a gem. A driveable par 4 modeled similarly to #6 at LACC North, the hole has so much strategy I spent my last few rounds playing multiple balls to different areas. Between the tee and hole exists an elongated 15 foot high scrub dune that juts out parallel to the green and the immense left gullied fairway. The safe play down this fairway allows an elevated 85-130yd approach over a large bunker onto a platformed green with a nasty right-side false front. The bolder tee shot takes on the dune (240-250 to carry) and finds another, albeit smaller ,slightly concave fairway and yields a 40-70yd wedge, chip or even putt to a more receptively-angled green. A good sized backboard permits even a bank shot to get close up for birdie. Like the better drivable 4's in the world, this beauty begs to be played with a full-on smile or smirk.
#5 is a charming mid-length par 3 affording Pacific Ocean views and the occasional distraction of a breaching Humpback whale. The shot needs a careful measure of the prevalent wind and like some of the better one-shotters I've seen in the modern era, Davis Love moved the tees along a horizontal line to achieve changes of distance instead of stacking them up aircraft-carrier style, thus changing angles along the way.
#6, a reachable par 5, bore a striking similarity, doppelgänger-style, to the fantastic and long par 4 15th at Friars Head. It plays longer than its yardage (437-475) and after comforting player on the tee with a wide downhill expanse, it moves back uphill and sharply narrows up to another pocketed green set amidst yet another large sandy dune. The green side surrounds were nicely banked and after understanding what was up there, the approaching golfer would eventually wisen up and use them to funnel the ball higher or lower to the respective pin position. Like a wickedly banked green at Ballyneal or Steamsong, you could easily entertain yourself (ala Policano style
) for quite some time with a few balls and a putter
#7 What does one do when you leave a margararita & taco station that is better than any Mexican restaurant in all of NJ and face a 223-290yd par slightly downhill par 3 "card wrecker?" I did what any thoughtful GCA'er would do.....went back for another margarita!
With no one behind me on any of my early am tee times, a dose of 8am courage was my best swing lube.
The green is huge and the backslope accommodating. A two here is magic, a three available and a four almost respectable. Like #2, the hole is beautifully framed by acres of sand, and like #5, the offset tees, make it fun to try at all the different yardage.
#'s 8 & 9 bring you back off the dunes and into the desert, and while neither undesirable or poor holes, they couple with #10 to provide almost an "intermission" to the show. That said, it should be noted that #9 is the course's sole par 4.5 with a wickedly delightful and rejecting false front...think #2 at Sand Hills.
It should be noted that the first nine is routed "cluster-style" mostly (with the exception of #5) on a dead North-South axis. Give DL 3 credit for not wasting an inch of the property and making most of the sand dunes. The front is eminently walkable and while laden with good views, far more golf centric an aesthetic than the back nine.
#10 Starts the back out far out on the South side of the clubhouse to once again take advantage of the dunes. Shuttle carts exist for the walker, but few walk, Instead preferring the knobby-tired carts that bounce along the wooden-tied cart paths. I wanted to believe it was some sort of homage to Pete Dye, but the course is entirely too natural to confirm it!
#11 An uphill mid-length (150-210) one-shotter that is brilliant and nearly world-class. Another large, undulating green that remains mostly hidden by elevation. It's front has a 20 yd apron and another, yet subtle, false front.Borrowed perhaps from C&C, this one has a greens-within
-a green playability.
A potential knock on Diamante is that it's greens are one size: Large. They are (save for #17), but they have respectable undulations that help compartmentalize them and ask the player to gauge the right shot in order to get close. #'s 11, 12 and 15 are clearly the best examples of this.
#12 GCA's very own Paul Cowley should be commended (with other than a plague in a bunker
) for re-routing and building (so long as Mother Nature allows him to keep it) an excellent new hole here. The previous 12 (&13) went back into desert flats away from the dunes and water. The new #12 offers a semi-blind "8 lane wide" driving zone left of the immense dune along the risk-reward line on the right providing the ultimate in strategic choice. Play it close to or over the dune's edge and an eagle might await. Down the left, there's room to spare and narrow-waisted lay-up is an easy iron. The hole is visually dramatic perched alongside another mammoth dune.
#13 Another Cowley work, this partially-blinded hole works brilliantly to skip back over the dune's spine. The hole's tee-to-green routing could've been found dozen's of places in the GB&I and the golfer's disorientation is complete until finished. The driving zone is split at 230ish by a pot bunker, scrub dune and pile of rocks. To the player's right lies a wide valley that bowls out and accepts most any shot short of 285. Between it and the green lies another scrub dune that is above the valley, thus obscuring the hole and blinding the shot. Off the tee to the players left is a narrow (but not excessively so...maybe 20 yes wide) gap fairway that enjoys an open view to the green under a 100 yds in. Obviously the preferred line of charm, the green, while bowled out a bit, sits 10-12 ft beneath the fairway and optically closer than it is. Another hole I really enjoyed playing several different balls to.
The earlier (and initial) #'s 12 & 13 were nice, but nondescript and shared a (storm water detention ??) pond that when viewed in the context of the rest of the golf property, were visually out of place and untrue to the dunescape nature of the balance of the course. The new holes are a vast improvement and will likely push this course even higher in it's world rank.
After yet another margarita and snack comfort (courage) station, the 14th awaited. A long (544-600+yd) wildly heaving par 5, narrows a bit as it goes down a gully and ultimately arrives at the course's wildest green (save for #9). This beauty is perched up amidst the dunes on a natural saddle and heaves across a tilted spine that bisects the green in its center. It's easy to hit two perfect shots from the tee and miss by just a tad and make bogey or worse. The wind also seems to intensify making it even sterner. Very tough, but eminently fair.
#15 Another big favorite with a split-like fairway that tumbles down towards the beach. Imagine a downhill and even wider version of Streamsong Blue's #1. Any ball pushed out right faces an uphill, blind, into the prevailing wind approach. The sandy waste pushes in from the left and helps create another splendid and strategic mid-4 par. The green is deep (and large) further testing one's meddle for any chance of a good number.
#16 A terrific little short with an optically confusing raised front with large pot bunker and peek-a-boo left opening on the left. The wind's strength and direction is the key to any score. Again, there is a considerably wide collar of shortly-mown collar that isn't all together obvious from the tee, but allows for some hope of recovery. The green has one of the more dramatic tiers found out here and longer putts likely yield more bogeys than pars.
#17 A really sporty and strategically appealing uphill Par 5 that has several diagonals to surmount before putting a putter in your hands. The first, an arroyo of waste demands carrying and a warning to not bite off more than you can chew. DL 3 wisely kept the tee height just high enough to see the fairway, but low enough to perplex a player about how much can be safely bitten off. A safe 225 carry down the left side reveals a line of diagonally large bunkers that again asks the question of how much to bite off. A better, 250+ carry catches a slope and leaves an easy perpendicular 2nd, or even a chance at the severely elevated green. It's worth noting here that yet another row of diagonally-placed bunkers lies just below the green to catch most missed final approaches, and the 17th's green is (finally) the smallest on the course.
#18 Some feel let down by this heaving uphill blind tee shot, hard 90 degree dog leg finisher. Understandable, but I really enjoyed it, finding it supremely challenging when asked to muster up a draw on my final tee shot to bend around the huge sandy pit down the left side. A fade flirts with danger or leaves the playing grounds. The fairway is among the widest on the course before narrowing and tumbling down to a green that plays front-to-back. This configuration allows for a ground-game option that yielded more birdies and pars than not when using the slope to feed a shot onto the green.
In summary the course, though set amidst massive dunes and understandably grassed in Pasapalum, was masterfully routed and plays and feels more links-like than any other Carribean course I've yet to see. Only the recent tawniness and water abutting holes of nearby Cabo Del Sol even remotely competes on those terms anywhere south of the border.
In addition, the experience of the club, it's musical and perfect practice grounds, its multiple "comfort" stations and the exemplary standard of service and cheerful attitude found among its employees sets it apart from most of its peers. Not even the most hardened old-school stuffed-shirt purist can help but appreciate and warm up to its charms. For those of you who want to see what its like to "get it right," add this one to your list.
Diamante Dunes is, in my estimation, a legitimate Top 50 course in the World. It's that good! Ken Jowdy, Davis Love 3, Paul Cowley, Len Zamora et.al should feel mighty proud.
Next Up....EL Cardonal & Quivira....Adios por ahora!