Ventana Canyon Golf Club - Mountain Course

Ventana Canyon Golf & Racquet Club is home to two outstanding Tom Fazio courses and a 50 room boutique hotel that is perfect for a golf stay and play.   Playing golf on either course is a challenging and memorable experience enhanced by the beauty of the lush desert foliage, mountain vistas, and the Sonoran wildlife. 

Each of the two courses at Ventana Canyon have their own unique personality and characteristics.  The Mountain Course winds it way up and down the Santa Catalina Mountains and has some stunning holes, outstanding desert scenery, and majestic panoramic vistas of the surrounding mountain ranges and the Tucson valley.  The Mountain Course is the most well known, primarily because of "the most photographed hole west of the Mississippi" a beautiful par 3 carved into the side of the mountain.  The Mountain Course is a little longer from the back tees and is the hardest of the 36 holes with a rating of 73.2 and slope of 145 versus the Canyon's 71.9 rating and 139 slope.   

Ventana Canyon's Canyon Course meanders through the Esperero Canyon and leverages the natural desert terrain to add challenges, elevation changes, and scenic beauty to your round.

Both courses have excellent conditions, first class service, and top notch facilities.  The Lodge at Ventana Canyon has some excellent stay and play packages as does the four star Loews Ventana Canyon Resort.  When you stay here make sure you play both courses for a fantastic golf experience.  In fact, just riding the golf cart on what seems like a 100 miles of trails that lead up and down the mountains, twist and turn through the canyon, and wind through the cactus and desert fauna is a fun and scenic experience.  

Speaking of cactus, the Saguaro cactus are amazing – tall (over 30') and stately and all shapes and sizes some with several golf balls embedded in their arms and body!  During your round on either course you're likely to see an abundance of wildlife –  coveys of Gambel's quail, red-tailed hawks, bobcats, deer, rabbits, coyotes, and roadrunners.

Ventana Canyon's Mountain Course is one of the best courses in the Tucson area:

• very scenic with panoramic vistas of several mountain ranges
• beautiful homes dotting the hillside
• a variety of dessert fauna with lots of color
• near perfect conditions
• a fantastic layout that is fun, challenging, and memorable

The Mountain Course is a typical Tom Fazo design with very demanding but fair holes, steep and deep bunkers, plenty of fairway mounding and contour, some tough approaches, and challenging green complexes.  The par 3's and the par 5's really set this 18 apart from other courses.  For example, on the front nine one of the par 3s is a demanding 230 yarder and the other is one of the best par 3s we have ever played.  Just the card and then the walk up to the tips tee box on the third hole is exciting and when you arrive and look down the mountain the view stretches of hundreds of miles across the Sonoran Desert, several mountain ranges, and a large part of Tucson – a Kodak moment for sure.  When you turn around you see a large green 107 yards down the mountain and across a deep ravine and the green is protected by a bunker on the left front and another ravine along the left side and large rock outcroppings along the right side – no room for error on this beauty.  Make sure you tee off from the back tee box and most likely you'll want to take a couple shots. 

After #3 you're probably still muttering some "wows" and "that was awesomes," when you arrive at the first of the four fantastic par 5's.  #4 is almost as visually stunning – an elevated tee box with a great view of the valley and mountains and a lush green fairway that dog legs left along a pristine sparkling blue lake to a green with no room for error.  #8 is another fantastic 517 yard par 5 with a slight uphill shot off the tee box, then back down and across an arroyo followed by an uphill approach to an elevated and well guarded green with steep and deep bunkers.   You'll finish your round with a long 589 yard par 5. 

Between the par 5s and 3s you'll find more memorable holes that demand some shot making and give you some risk reward opportunities as well as test your game with treacherous deep and steep bunkers, elevated shots, dog legs, tight tee and approach shots, and forced carries.

The conditions on the Mountain Course at Ventana Canyon were near perfect – the greens rolled true and fast and smooth and the fairways were lush and plush.  The entire course is well maintained and manicured.  The fairways are lined by the desert and a scattering of beautiful homes set well back from the fairway.  The fairways are ample with a manageable rough, but if you miss both you'll be playing in the cactus, which are very sharp!

The greens are about average size for the area and most have some gentle slope and undulation.  However, on the shorter higher handicap holes, Fazio make the greens very challenging – elevated, severe slope, tiers, and undulation.  When we played the greens were running around a 10 to 11 and they held the ball very well.

Ventana Canyon Golf & Racquet Club is well deserving of all the awards and accolades it has won over the last few years, some of which include:  Top Public Golf Course, Best Resort Courses, and Best Resort!    If you are anywhere close to Tucson you need to make every effort to play both of these courses.