Golf Scrapbook Blog (The Other Ones)

The Golf Club at Gray’s Crossing (and North Lake Tahoe area golf)

Played Gray’s Crossing as part of a conference trip to the area back in 2012. We played three of the courses here and stayed at the Ritz at the Northstar resort but I believe that is no longer a Ritz. North Lake Tahoe is a pretty golf-rich area that if you’re a fan of mountain golf you’ll love.

Gray’s Crossing and Old Greenwood are sister courses – part of the Tahoe Mountain Club. They straddle I-80 but both offer a real mountain golf vibe. Neither track is cramped with housing and both offer (and Coyote Moon does too which I also played) great views and isolated, tree-lined holes. For East Coasters this ain’t easy to get to (we drove in from Reno after connecting) but if you’re looking for a mountain golf trip for either buddies or couples, this is a pretty good stop.

A lot of what I have read or seen has Old Greenwood outranking Gray’s. In fact the PGA is coming to Old Greenwood for the Stableford-formatted Barracuda Championship (played opposite the St. Jude Invitational) in August 2021. And while neither gets any golf magazine love, from time-to-time Old Greenwood has appeared in the best public tracks in California listings while Gray’s has not.

I’m really splitting hairs but I put Gray’s on top here. I just had more fun playing the course versus Greenwood and Coyote so I rank it ahead. To the course, this was a little bit ago so I vaguely remember the round and couldn’t go hole-by-hole. Found the scorecard and shot a respectable 89 (respectable for me that is) with a 43 on the back. Eighteen above is the most memorable hole where you play up along a mountainy waste area to the right but need to cross it to get to the green. The photo above is from the clubhouse looking across this “waste” area to the fairway. The holes are tree-lined so if you’re spraying the ball, you better hope you’re good at Plinko in getting the ball back out to the fairway through the trees. Conditioning was great. And the elevations add a couple of yards to your drives and approaches so you feel good about yourself and your manhood hitting 280 yard drives.

For Old Greenwood, I found the card and shot a 65. Yes it was indeed a scramble and Johnny Cocktails and I played with a couple of ladies (I think our friend Katie who is a much better golfer than any of us), We usually blow off the scrambles and just play our own balls but we obviously didn’t here. I remember there was a bit more water here than on Gray’s but conditioning was equally good. The pros will play this to over 7,500 yards but with the elevation and a few mid-300-yard holes, they’re expecting some opportunities for some high numbers (remember in Stableford you get points for eagles and birdies so want to go high).

For Coyote Moon, the first hole is absolutely awesome and the elevation changes are more dramatic than either Gray’s or Greenwood. Probably the only reason I rank it lower is we played as a two-some and had a mopey four-some ahead of us and it felt like a Chinese Death March. I shouldn’t let that affect my rankings on courses but I so loathe slow play that it just kills my round and enjoyment. Look as a two-some, you’re going to wait but if the group in front is playing with purpose and not having to walk back to carts or plumb-bobbing putts or generally not playing ready golf, it sucks. I discuss golf mopiness here. Found my scorecard and shot a 92 after a 43 on the front. Yes the slow play got into my head.

So if you’re planning a golf trip here, these are your three best public options. There is another course at Northstar that we didn’t play but my buddies that did said it’s, “meh.” If you got the where-with-all to do it, Lahontan and Martis Camp are two top-rated private clubs in the area. We didn’t even try to get on so couldn’t tell you whether it takes a coup to pull it off or simply a call or stay on property. Obviously if you’re perusing the California golf rankings (or watch the pro-am every year at Edgewood-Tahoe) you may be thinking about adding that to the rota if you come out here. We didn’t. First, Lake Tahoe is a big-ass lake. It’s about an hour drive from the Ritz (or whatever it is now). Second we didn’t have a car. I guess all things being equal and if I came out with the time and a car, I’d probably give it a go.

Truckee is a little resort town. While we spent most of the time either golfing or at conference events in the Ritz, there are some nice restaurants in town. Or there were before COVID/Newsom. Pianeta was one that we went to and it was a nice rustic Italian restaurant in town. I checked on Google and it is still open. We had a great meal experience at the Ritz (they had a big table in the kitchen) but not sure the new owners kept it the same. All in all, I would put this on the radar for a golf trip even if you’re from the Bos-Wash megapolis. If you’re in NorCal, my guess is you’ve already taken the trip on multiple occasions.

Gray’s Crossing