By this time we had already booked the stay at Pebble Beach and the three courses we were going to play there. The Pebble Beach portion was at the end of our trip and we would first play Pebble Beach on a mid-morning tee time to allow us plenty of time to warm up and soak in the experience. We would then play Spyglass Hill first thing the next morning. On the last full day of our trip we had a tee time for the Links at Spanish Bay first thing in the morning.
This left us with three other potential golfing days prior to getting to Pebble Beach. We would not be able to play golf the days we arrived or departed from SFO due to the times of our flights. With the hotel reservations we had booked we would have time to play one or two courses in the San Francisco area and one or two in the Monterey area. If we played two in one area we would only be able to play one in the other. We did not want to overload ourselves and play multiple rounds in a day.
We wanted to play the nicer courses as well. Since we were saving a lot of money with the hotels and flights due to miles and my savvy hotel booking skills, price was not a determining factor in choosing the courses.
We also wanted to play courses we hadn’t played before. We had made a golf trip to nearby San Jose several years prior to this trip and played a few courses then. While we really enjoyed those courses, we wanted to make sure we were trying new courses since there are so many great options.
Searching
There were a LOT of courses to choose from. I initially had a list of about a dozen amazing courses between the San Francisco and Monterey areas. It was going to be tough to narrow those options down.
We exchanged lots of emails between the four of us to try to see if there were any clear winners we could agree on or to rule out.
In the end we narrowed our search in San Francisco to between TPC Harding Park and the Presidio Golf Course. Harding Park is a course that has hosted PGA events and was highly rated. It’s in the city of San Francisco itself. The Presidio is also in the city and is located in the Presidio area of the city appropriately enough. Both are public courses that looked to be quite challenging, be in amazing condition and had excellent reviews. The Presidio looked especially narrow with fairways lined with rows of intimidating trees for us not-so-straight hitters.
We had come to a consensus early on that we wanted to play Half Moon Bay Golf Links located between San Francisco and Santa Clara to the south. Due to our planned travel days to Monterey, it made sense to play that as the second day of golf with the first day being one of the San Francisco courses. Half Moon Bay is a beautiful area on the Pacific Coast with amazing views and scenery. It’s part of a resort that has a Ritz Carlton and the courses are links style.
In Monterey there were two courses that really caught our eye. Pacific Grove Golf Links and Bayonet and Blackhorse Golf Course were the options we would have to choose between. Pacific Grove billed itself as a hidden gem and is located right on the Pacific so it would have an amazing backdrop. Bayonet and Blackhorse were two courses located on the Fort Ord military base and were open to the public. They came highly rated and looked to be quite challenging courses.
Booking
For San Francisco, we ended up choosing the Presidio Golf Course. The pictures of the course ended up growing on us more than those from TPC Harding Park. I was able to book a morning tee time for us on the first full day we were on the west coast which turned out to be a Sunday. It would allow us to avoid much of the notorious Bay Area traffic as it’s located in the middle of San Francisco. It would allow us to explore the city in the afternoon if we felt up to it or head back to the hotel to rest.
For the second round we had to choose which of the two courses at Half Moon Bay Golf Links we wanted to play. We decided on the Ocean Course and booked a morning time as well. Our body clocks would still be on east coast time so getting up early would not be a problem. We’re all morning people anyways and the early time would help us avoid some of the Monday morning traffic.
For the third and final round before Pebble Beach we were leaning towards Pacific Grove Golf Links. It looked fantastic. When calling to book a tee time, the date we were interested in was blocked off due to a special event so we wouldn’t be able to play that day.. Instead we ended up choosing Bayonet and Blackhorse. This course is a public course on a military base and has two courses. We ended up playing the Bayonet course which was told it was the harder of the two. I tend towards playing harder courses. We got a mid-morning tee time and there would be no traffic to deal with.
Summary
By this time the trip was coming together. The itinerary would look like this:
Friday evening – Everyone would meet at my house for final preparations and to spend the night
Saturday – Up well before the break of dawn to get to the airport and travel to SF and check into the hotel
Sunday – Morning round of golf at Presidio Golf Course in San Francisco
Monday – Morning round at Half Moon Bay and then travel south to Monterey
Tuesday – Morning round a Bayonet Golf Course near Monterey
Wednesday – Mid-morning round a Pebble Beach!
Thursday – Morning round at Spyglass Hill
Friday – Checkout and play final round at the Links at Spanish Bay. Drive back to hotel near SFO
Saturday – Up before dawn to catch our flight home
Tomatico Travels 
You must be logged in to post a comment.