Mesquite, Nevada still carries a reputation as something of free-wheeling, rugged-jeans-wearing kind of gambling town. It is about the last place you can stop and come to your senses before crossing the border into Utah. And ending up somewhere like Salt Lake City. It’s gambling without the sometimes overpowering Vegas tourist glitz and LA road party scene. It’s where a guy in work jeans can feel comfortable playing poker next to a guy in a golf shirt. The only way you’d get Paris Hilton to Mesquite is if a reality show sent her there in an RV. In other words, it’s just ... full post »

All those rabid Michelle Wie delusionals had to be disappointed to flip through the last issue of Sports Illustrated and see their girl posing in the year-in-review photos. So much for that Wie camp SI ban that the Wie Warriors hoped for after the magazine’s writer Michael Bamberger rightly called her on a rules violation. Wie’s not banning Sports Illustrated. The mere notion was laughable. Not because she knows she was wrong. Because that would go against everything the Michelle Wie marketing machine stands for: publicity. So there was Wie in SI, in a pose Rebel Blogger could appreciate. A California newspaper ... full post »

If you’re in Palm Springs, enjoying the golf and monotonously wonderful 70 degree and sunny days, make sure to check out the weekly Thursday night street fair in downtown. In an area where a black and white photo of Frank Sinatra or Bob Hope passes as high culture, the street fair boasts actual local character. They close the main drag in town to cars, set up booths in the middle of the street (think cheap good food and trinkets) and people stroll around. Yes, sometimes people do actually walk in California. If you’ve always stayed out in La Quinta on your Coachella Valley ... full post »

Standing on top of a plateau tee, it feels like you’re scraping the sky. The clouds never seemed so close. You might check to make sure you still have two feet on the ground. Or duck your head slightly, thinking you could bump it against a cloud the way Shaq might against a doorway. Playing golf at Wolf Creek Golf Club in Mesquite, Nevada is definitely a surreal experience. And as you move around the course, you’ll see other golfers on the towering plateau tees, little dots in the distance. The tee box settings are a show to themselves. What course do ... full post »

Getting a haircut in a little, local Palm Springs barbershop, I found myself running into the whole Merry Christmas/Happy Holidays argument. One of the barbers wished a departing customer, “Happy Holidays.” This caused his next customer to launch into a long lecture on the problem with saying Happy Holidays and how it should always be Merry Christmas. This guy was so passionate about the subject he went on for 20 minutes plus. The barber cutting his hair just quietly listened, somehow resisting the temptation to clip the self-appointed Merry Christmas’ policeman’s ear. No one loves a good controversy more than me. I’m all ... full post »

Just went through a run of two weeks plus in Palm Springs. After about day four, you could be excused for thinking the local weather guys were playing hooky, replaying the same forecast night after night after night. Seventy degrees and sunny every day. Except when it was seventy one degrees and sunny. It was actually 66 degrees and overcast on Saturday. Which caused many locals to break out their winter jackets. No kidding. A woman at the SilverRock course grill told me she’d gotten wimpy after moving from that frigid gulag San Jose. Yes, they’re about as hardy as Michael Jackson ... full post »

Some old reputations die hard. In Palm Springs, literally. This is a place that many people believe is stuck in the 1950s, an area where anyone without white hair is bound to feel like an outsider. And there’s something to that. The lead story on the local TV news last week was Gerald Ford going to the hospital for his yearly checkup. This brought the kind of blanket coverage most news organizations save for reporting on a hurricane or terror threat. He has a cold! Gerald Ford has a cold! Which begs the question: Does anyone outside of Palm Springs still think Gerald ... full post »

If you’re looking for a place in the Palm Springs area devoid of any trace of local color, The River is your hangout. The River is an immensely popular outdoor mall/restaurant row that could have been lifted straight from Minneapolis, Kansas City, Dallas or Connecticut. If you’re golfing in greater Palm Springs, somebody’s going to recommend that you eat there. Probably several somebodies. It’s not necessarily a bad recommendation to take. There’s the requiste Cheesecake Factory, a big Border’s and nice-sized movie theater. Almost all the restaurants and shops are national chains. The best of the bunch - unless you’re one of ... full post »

Know a smug low handicap golfer who’s always rubbing his good shots in your face? The kind of guy who gloats over every $1 hole win, while refusing to give any strokes, even though the competition’s about as evenly matched as a tank versus a paper airplane? Suggest a round at the PGA West TPC Stadium course and watch the playing field level. Yes, we’re talking the Pete Dye design with the petrifying rep, the one with 151 slope rating from the back tees, the one that the pros whined about being just too difficult. Crazy for a high handicapper challenge? Try ... full post »

Morgan Pressel’s grandfather Herb Krickstein is leading the campaign to let Pressel play as a full LPGA member several months before her 18th birthday. Krickstein makes the right point that if Morgan could handle Q-school no sweat and come one Birdie Kim miracle from winning the U.S. Women’s Open, she’s earned full membership. Why should a birthday stand in the way? This isn’t a debate about sticking to the letter of ridiculous rules though. It’s an appreciation of a guardian who tells it like it is. Krickstein challenged outgoing LPGA commissioner Ty Votaw when they met in June with “What if she ... full post »

Everyone who’s ever flown has heard the frightening tales of bungling about LAX. Los Angeles International Airport is known for being evacuated when a housewife manages to unwittingly slip past 10 rings of security, of being shutdown and backed up. It’s supposed to be the air travel equivalent of a root canal, about as convenient as an enema. I know people who fly out of their way just to avoid using LAX. So it was with some trepidation that I found myself going through Los Angeles airport. It only turned into the smoothest golf air travel trip ever. The golf bag was off ... full post »

One of the things that makes Phoenix-Scottsdale such a satisfying golf spot is the sheer abundance of off course options. It’s a town where you get a restaurant like Village Tavern. This place in one of strip mall shopping centers along Scottsdale Road gives you heapings of gourmet food for near Denny’s prices. The salmon benedict plate is packed full of great tasting food for under $10. And you can find restaurants like Village Tavern throughout the spread out desert valley. That’s part of why Phoenix-Scottsdale may be the best value golf hotspot on the West Coast. You’re not eating this well ... full post »

TravelGolf.com isn’t invited to many grand openings. We tend to be a little too honest (no matter what you’ve read elsewhere, every course isn’t great, great, great!), a little too scruffy (have you seen the Cheap Bastard?), a little too irreverent (see BadGolfer). So sometimes we have to create our own openings. TravelGolf.com recently became the first golf publication to play the newly $5 million renovated Robert Trent Jones Sr. courses at Wigwam Resort. More than a month before the official hoity toity opening “event” where mainstream golf writers will be able to share golf tips with mayors, TravelGolf.com was out on ... full post »