Northwest golfers will find 201 golf courses in the state of Washington where the public is welcome; several of these locations have more than one course. Play them all, and you’ll encounter some of the state’s most beautiful landscapes. You can tee off within view of the Pacific Ocean, golf in the shadow of Mount St. Helens, the state’s most active volcano, or play in the high desert of eastern Washington.
Golfers in Washington are rewarded with gorgeous views; you can see at least one snow-capped mountain from the majority of the state’s courses. Mount St. Helens, Mt. Rainier and Mt Adams are among the most beautiful, but there are numerous other mountain peaks in this state that also provide a gorgeous backdrop for a game of golf.
Most of the land’s natural features have been worked into the designs of Washington’s golf courses, transforming natural beauty into course hazards. You can golf within view of the Strait of Juan de Fuca, next to the Columbia River and Columbia River Gorge, and alongside dozens of rivers and waterways; and like all water, it’s waiting to claim your ball. Wet encounters for this state’s golfers include rushing rivers, waterfalls, lakes, wetlands and creeks.
Course designers include Arnold Palmer, Bunny Mason, Robert Muir Graves, Robert Trent Jones, Mike Asmundson, Peter Jacobsen, Chandler Egan, Robert Cupp, William Overdorf, John Harbottle, Bob Tachell, Jack Frei and John Fought.
Multiple-hole courses are popular in Washington. In Redmond, at Willows Run Golf Club you can choose from a total of 45 holes. And, there are several courses in this state that offer 36 holes; you’ll find double 18’s in Blaine, Bremerton, Lacey and Bellevue. Triple nine-hole courses are located in Burlington, Chehalis, Port Ludlow, Fort Lewis and Puyallup. And in Kent and Tacoma they have courses with a combination of both 9 and 18 holes.
Although hundreds of golf courses have been in the planning stages for years, only a handful of new courses were built in Washington in recent years. The northern portion of Washington’s I-5 Corridor got most of those new golf courses, but Central Washington is the site of the last course opened; Suncadia Rope Rider opened in Cle Elum late in 2011.
With the opening of this course, Central Washington now has four 18-hole golf courses that are longer than 7000 yards; Eastern Washington also has four courses longer than 7000 yards.
Washington green fees vary depending on the season and time of day, but most of the state’s golf courses have times when golfers can play for discounted rates. Golfers can save more than half over regular rates by knowing when to play.
