Fairway to Heaven

When I was asked to write a Playboy story on the world's top golf courses, I flashed on years of reading the magazine—the news-making interviews, the lifestyle tips, the big-name fiction. Okay, I flashed on the pictures. This magazine isn't just read; it's consumed. It's conceived with a lens and dedicated to the proposition that we all love rapturous vistas and killer curves. So I decided Playboy's list of courses shouldn't merely include the best—though they're here—but the best looking. These are the golf courses you'd love to stare at and roll around on, the ones you can picture on the catwalk, strutting their stuff. They're the sport's supermodels. With my years of playing professionally and doing CBS TV commentary (I'm the guy who got kicked off the air for saying the slick greens at the 1994 Masters had been "bikini waxed") I have spent my life ogling golf courses. Every football field or tennis court is pretty much the same, but golf courses, like supermodels, are different in thrilling ways. Each has its own graceful silhouette, its fragrances, its unique style and mystique. Not to mention its petulance. Okay, you beauties, step up and show'em what you got.

North Course, Los Angeles Country Club, California As you wander hedonistic Hollywood you may pass a club that inhabits a buttoned-up, old-school world. Meet Los Angeles Country Club, a gem cut from green hills by George C. Thomas Jr. in 1921. The North Course at LACC winds through the canyons off Wilshire Boulevard on some of the choicest real estate on earth. You almost expect to see Cary Grant coming out of the white antebellum-style clubhouse. Alas, people in showbiz were never welcome here—too tacky, don't you know. Legend has it that movie star Randolph Scott applied for membership and was told, "Sorry, no actors." Scott replied, "If you think I'm an actor, you haven't seen my movies."

Sure, it's a great course, but one of the planet's 10 best? On my list it is, mainly for one great hole on the back nine. Not the famous 11th, a stunner of a 244-yard par three with Oscar-worthy views of Los Angeles. I mean the 14th, which winds past a certain Mansion. As a young golf pro, I loved trying to peek over the hedge to gaze at Playboy Mansion West, a.k.a. Hef's house. I wasn't tall enough to see anything, but hearing screaming toucans in Hef's private zoo fired my thoughts of partying Playmates. Long live those thoughts that lift men's spirits!

Royal County Down Golf Club, Newcastle, Northern Ireland For my next pick I turned to a man who has roamed the world in a death-defying quest to antagonize absolutely everyone. David Feherty is a vituperative Irish lad who has played the game at its highest level and now works for CBS, dragging our commentary down to his low level. He is my friend.

"On a good day," Feherty says, "Royal County Down is the best experience in golf. Unfortunately, Ulster has only four good days per millennium. The best time to play is May or June, when the gorse and heather are in bloom. But only a fool would pass up the chance to play here, even in a blizzard. When you walk off the third green, take the path to the back of the fourth.Don't look behind you until you get there. Now turn and feast your eyes on the game's most stunning par-three hole—a couple hundred yards over a yellow-green and lilac sea to a greenthe size of a pigmy's nipple, surrounded by mine-shaft bunkers, with the Mourne Mountains sweeping down to the Irish Sea in the background. You'll need a big sack of golf balls."

Shinnecock Hills Golf Club, Southampton, New York On windswept Long Island lies a stunning course—the first 18-hole links ever built on the East Coast. Founded in 1891, Shinnecock has been home to four U.S. Opens, including the war of attrition held in 2004. What I like most about Shinny is how it blends its rolling fairways through the land's hollows and heights. The rough is visually stunning, cut in varying lengths. The justly famous 14th hole, a 447-yard par four, is a bear into the wind, a long drive over scrub to a fairway that looks as wide as your thumb. The hole is called Thorn's Elbow after long-ago pro Charlie Thorn, who liked to bend his at the local bar. There's another reason Shinnecock belongs on this list. I'm talking about the clubhouse. It was designed by the J famed architect Stanford White, who was married but had a taste for teenage girls. White kept a love nest in Manhattan, complete with a velvet swing that hung from the ceiling. After his 16-year-old mistress married one Harry Thaw, Thaw heard about her lover and went nuts. In 1906, gun blazing, he barged into another building White had designed, Madison Square Garden, and shot the amorous architect dead.

Pine Valley Goff Club, Clementon, New Jersey New Jersey's Pine Valley is arguably the best course in the world. It's so private that the word exclusive doesn't cover it. Try impossible. Getting there is half the fun. You follow the smells of popcorn and fear until you reach Clementon Amusement Park and Splash World. With roller-coaster screams fading in your ears, follow the railroad tracks until you pass through a crooked chain-link fence. Give your ID to the guard at the gatehouse. If he lets you in, rejoice: You are entering golf nirvana. "Despite its unprepossessing environs," wrote golf scribe Charles Price, "Pine Valley is one of the most beautiful golf courses in the world. It has no backdrop of mountains, no craggy coastlines with waves lapping the shores. It is simply gorgeous in its own right."

The course cultivates an unkempt beauty. Think supermodel in the morning. You see bunkers that look like they've been slept in, half-wild native grass you could get lost in. These curves are worth licking your lips over. The 448-yard 13th is sort of our sport's Vampirella. One writer likened it to "the horror film, the ghost train and the chamber of horrors." Your score there will probably suck. Then there's the nasty par-three 10th, protected by a deep, dark, notorious bunker. How hard is it to get out of this trap? The nickname says it all. It's called the Devil's Asshole.

Pacific Dunes Golf Course, Bandon, Oregon Oregon's rugged coastline is home to wandering seabirds and men fulfilling their golfing destinies. The golfers tell tales of bizarre beauty and lost balls in a rough wonderland called Bandon Dunes Golf Resort, the game's latest mecca and home to three terrific tracks: Bandon Dunes, Bandon Trails and my choice, Pacific Dunes. Tom Doak designed the course in 2001. Correction: Doak's evil mind hatched it during a Èightmare. And I mean that in a good way. Pacific Dunes hides its cruelty in beauty. It looks like it sprang from a landscape painter's canvas. Every craggy nook and verdant cranny is a visual epiphany. Twelve holes come nose-to-nose with the ocean, while the inland holes sneak through the forest. While you're in there, beware the long, lean seventh hole, which is so breathtaking you don't know whether to stand there admiring it or just go ahead and double-bogey. Be sure to bring your camera—Pacific Dunes is a place for your shutter. Wherever you turn, she's posing for you.

Straits Course, Whistling Straits, Kohler, Wisconsin In the heart of cheese country you'll find a course that looks like Ireland. Woven through dairy land and Lake Michigan shoreline are 560 acres of what used to be pancake-flat wasteland. Now it's a curvaceous challenge that'll get your Irish up. This great idea was flushed from the head of toilet tycoon Herb Kohler. There are four courses at Kohler's American Club, but the Straits Course is the hood ornament. Conceived by Kohler and laid out by architect Pete Dye, it opened in 1998 and hosted the 2004 PGA Championship. This is rural beauty, the farmer's-daughter kind. You can picture elves running around this land. Eight holes are flush with the lake; 10 are intertwined with rolling dunes and scruffy bunkers—more than 1,200 bunkers in all. You'll enjoy the dogleg-left 16th hole, called Endless Bite, which dares you to take liberties with your driver. Next comes Pinched Nerve, one of the scariest par-threes this side of Hades. The green is on a shelf that looks like it hangs out over Lake Michigan. No matter how bad your score, you'll want to personally thank Mr. Kohler at the end of the day. If golf were poker, the toilet mogul's course would be a royal flush.

Kauri Cliffs Golf Course, Northland, New Zealand The brainchild of New York developer Julian Robertson, the 6,000-acre Kauri Cliffs is so far off the beaten track, it is still virgin territory for the most ambitious golf travelers. Standing on cliffs high above the Pacific, you feel like you could take one step and hang glide. The cliff-side holes deserve centerfolds. The seventh, a par-three as ruggedly stunning as any on earth, is a slicer's nightmare. Reload and try again; she's a harsh mistress.

Don't worry about racing back to the States after your round—the Lodge at Kauri Cliffs boasts 180-degree Pacific panoramas, plus an infinity pool, three secluded beaches and Astroturf tennis courts. Okay, it's $600 to $1,600 a night, but the minibar is on the house. Toss in another $650 for a clinic with the pro, Michael Campbell, who beat Tiger Woods to win last year's U.S. Open. Before you head home, indulge in some world-class fishing. It's all here. As ABC's Jack Whitaker said of the place, "Mother Nature had a free hand in creation here and went way over budget."

Cypress Point Club, Pebble Beach, California There is only one hole I have ever stayed up all night worrying about. A hole that defines the cruel logic of risk versus reward. A hole so jaw-dropping it dissolves the ego and leaves you drooling. Cypress Point, a stone's throw from Big Sur on the coast of northern California, is a gem from start to finish, but the real diva is the 16th hole, a carry of more than 200 yards over seals, raging sea and old trees growing out of rocks. It is the most famous par-three on earth. Cypress Point is the antithesis of its gorgeous neighbor, Pebble Beach. Pebble is a resort, as famous as any in the world. Cypress is shy and wants to be alone. Pebble is always expanding to keep up with the times, while Cypress keeps contracting to maintain its heritage. Pebble is Trump (think Donald's money and Melania's looks), while Cypress is Yoda. The course was built in 1928 by the great Dr. Alister MacKenzie, who wrote, "There is, first, a natural beauty of surrounding found only on British seaside courses, and added to this is the fascination Èf wending one's way through woods, over immense dunes, to typically inland scenes. It is unsurpassed, having waited for centuries only to have the architect's molding hand to sculpture a course without peer." Yeah, baby!

Cape Kidnappers Goff Course, Hawke's Bay, New Zealand If you just went and made the 40-hour round-trip to Kauri Cliffs, here are two more words of advice: Go back! There's an even more gorgeous course in New Zealand, in a setting so sexy you can hear the sirens singing as you swing. Another Julian Robertson project, this one designed by Tom Doak, Cape Kidnappers perches on a cliff top overlooking the Pacific; many holes slope toward the ocean as if reaching for a lover. The cliffs rise more than 100 yards above the sea. Three holes force you to hit over a chasm to the next ridge. "At the sixth and 15th holes," Doak warns, "it's possible to pull your approach off the very end of the earth, though it will take nearly 10 seconds of hang time for your ball to reach the ocean below." You'll feel like a tightrope walker on the 15th, a vertiginous par five with sheer drops of 60 feet to the right and 460 to the left. Cape Kidnappers is just a few hours down the road from where the Lord of the Rings movies were shot. Precious indeed.

Pebble Beach Golf Links, Pebble Beach, California Situated on the coast of northern California and sandwiched between the dreamy seaside towns of Monterey and Carmel, Pebble Beach is the end of the road. Welcome to paradise. I first played this course at the California state amateur tournament in the early 1960s. Ten of us young guys bunked in one motel room, most of us on the floor. And we loved it. We hadn't yet discovered that golf is hard.

Robert Louis Stevenson once called this bit of coastline "the greatest meeting of land and sea in the world." From the dogleg-right first hole to the gorgeous, famous par-five 18th, every inch of Pebble is perfect. And very expensive. But don't think of this course's greens fee as $425 a round—think of it as $23.61 a hole. May the wind always be at your back.

He's a seasoned pro, a CBS announcer and an accomplished golf writer. He may have the sharpest, Wittiest mind in the game. That's why we asked Gary McCord to name the world's 10 greatest golf destinations. The grass doesn't get any greener than this.

Playmate Data Sheet

Name: Pebble Beach Golf Links

Age: 87

Dimensions: 36 36 72

Front: 6,1l6 yards

Back: 6,737 yards

Slope: 142

Turn-ons: Lawn mowers, ocean views, having Clint Eastwood as one of my owners, secret midnight trysts on the fairways and a man who knows how to swing.

Turnoffs: Golfers who don't replace their divots, slow rounds, golf wristwatches that keep your score, rodents and anybody who dresses like Jesper Parnevik.

Favorite Memory: Tom Watson's famous 1982 Chip shot on my 17th hole, which fell in for a birdie and put him in the lead by one stroke over Jack Nicklaus with one hole left to go in the U.S. Open (see photo below). Watson won the tournament Attaboy.

19th Hole: There's nothing like the slow-roasted prime rib, a plate of baked oysters and a Guinness or three at my Tap Room after a round.

People Say I Look Like: Elle Macpherson covered in Krazy Glue and then rolled in finely cut grass.