Last week’s piece on golf resorts and spas was so much a hit with the ladies, we’re going to give a bonus piece. So for Britt from Arlington and her golf friends from D.C., here’s Volume 2 of Golf and ***cringe***Spas…
Leatherstocking Golf Club at the Otesaga Hotel
Do you like baseball? How about Colonial American history? Opera and ballet? Okay, how about lounging by the shores of a lake so sparking and idyllic the locals call it “Glimmerglass?” Then a week at Leatherstocking and the Otesaga Hotel is just what you’re looking for.
In 1790 William and Elizabeth Fenimore Cooper moved to the rugged frontier of upstate New York with their then infant son James, one of the family’s thirteen children, and who would eventually be revered as one of our country’s greatest novelists and the father of American frontier literature.
Cooperstown is actually named for William, not James. William’s wealth and position as a judge allowed him the privilege of establishing the settlement and having it bear his family name. A child born into status, James was educated by private tutors at Yale, where he enrolled in 1803, only to be expelled two years later after a prank went awry. (He set off an explosion that blew off a fellow student’s dormitory door.) Yet despite an inauspicious youth, the son’s fame soon eclipsed the father’s.
James’s headstrong nature and feistiness eventually sparked his desire to become a writer. If his family history is true, James threw down a book in disgust claiming he could produce a better effort himself. When his wife, Susan Augusta DeLancey, dared him to try – adding insult to injury by claiming he could barely write a simple letter – James began a career that spanned thirty-two novels, political tracts, and naval histories.
Cooperstown, located in the bucolic splendor of upstate New York is not only home to more than two centuries of American history, but also the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame, the Glimmerglass Opera House, the Otesaga Hotel, and Leatherstocking Golf Club, a Devereux Emmet design which remains largely untouched since it’s creation in the 1909/1919. (Holes 16 and 17 are the two exceptions, being completely modern.)
The course is not overly long or penal, but the greens are devious and the hilly terrain helps defend par as well. The course won’t beat you up, but if your short game isn’t on, you may bleed to death from a thousand cuts. The par-5s are the best holes on the course.
The course is also gorgeous, set hard by the banks of the serene, pristine lake. The famous 18th hole begins at an island tee box set in the middle of the lake, then sweeps around the shoreline in a dramatic finish.
The Otesaga Hotel has everything you need – swimming, meals, spa, and access to all the attractions Cooperstown has to offer. It gets a little pricey in high summer. In September when the leaves are changing it must be as golden as Lothlorien. The Hotel is mere steps from the first tee and the walk from the locker room, through the hallway lined with the portraits of the great athletes, celebrities, and historic figures that have played the course before you out to the tee box is great bit of vicarious fun.
World Woods
Britt, if you and your crew are into golf and spa…and nothing else…then playing at World Woods and staying at the companion Plantation Inn is a great choice.
It’s all about the golf at World Woods, which not only has 36 holes, but an enormous “practice park” complete with three warm-up holes. There are two courses: the flagship is Pine Barrens, a “sand, scrub, and pines” style course meant to look like famous Pine Valley. The course succeeds to a remarkable extent, and is widely regarded as Tom Fazio’s most intelligent design and his best greens as well. The other course, Rolling Oaks, is a prettier, more classic parkland style course, which is a completely different experience than Pine Barrens.
World Woods is one of those places that the golf cognoscenti all appreciate, and you’ll see logos from famous golf courses all over the World when hanging out in the clubhouse.
You’ll need ground transport to do World Woods because it’s in the middle of nowhere. The sleepy town of Brooksville is between 90 and 120 minutes from either Tampa/St. Pete or Orlando, and the Plantation Inn is 12 miles away from the course. Still, the hotel is quite comfortable, with excellent food, a spa, a Jacuzzi, and tennis. The stately charm of the Inn is a wonderful contrast to tacky Orlando, and World Woods is second only to mighty Sawgrass when it comes to public golf in Florida. (At least until Streamsong Resort comes on-line next year. Then you’ll have four courses to play, not just two!)
