Category: Alabama

FarmLinks at Pursell Farms – Field (& Mountain) & Stream

FarmLinks at Pursell Farms – Field (& Mountain) & Stream

The remarkable par-3 5th. It can be a little difficult to describe FarmLinks, one of the more unique and entertaining golf destinations in the Southeast. FarmLinks is the name of the golf course located on a bucolic 3,500-acre family-operated preserve about an hour south of Birmingham. The Michael Hurdzan and Dana Fry design wanders freely just about…

Read More Read More

“Remembering” Craft Farms

“Remembering” Craft Farms

Critics are typically charged with making judgments based on first or preliminary impressions. Movie critics don’t typically have the luxury of watching films over and over to absorb their intricacies. Wine critics can render reviews after rifling through dozens of glasses in one sitting. Book reviewers have to process enormous amounts of material on deadline.…

Read More Read More

RTJ Trail – Oxmoor Valley: Vertigo at the Ridge Course

RTJ Trail – Oxmoor Valley: Vertigo at the Ridge Course

Certain elements of the Ridge Course at Oxmoor Valley in southeast Birmingham are fairly outrageous. I think of the 1st and 2nd holes (formerly the 10th and 11th, a par-4 followed by a par-5, one going uphill, the other downhill) that are so steep they play like a life size Q-bert pyramid where the only place a ball can come to rest…

Read More Read More

RTJ Trail: Smoothing Into Oxmoor Valley’s Valley Course

RTJ Trail: Smoothing Into Oxmoor Valley’s Valley Course

The Valley Course at Oxmoor Valley makes a dramatic entrance with a tee shot that drops nearly 200 feet to a fairway bracketed by large clover bunkers. The rest of the routing covers the tamer flats on the western side of Little Shades Mountain with none of the big up and down movements of the Ridge Course, at…

Read More Read More

The RTJ Trail Highlight: Grand National’s Lake Course

The RTJ Trail Highlight: Grand National’s Lake Course

Many people, and many rankings, consider the Lake Course at Grand National the best stop on Alabama’s Robert Trent Jones Trail. I’m not sure I agree (Ross Bridge) but I wouldn’t waste time arguing with them. Other locations have their strong points, but if you want to know what the Trail is all about visit here…

Read More Read More

Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail: A Real Stew at Grand National’s Links Course

Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail: A Real Stew at Grand National’s Links Course

If it’s true the Lake course at Grand National is the most balanced course on the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail (perhaps), the Links is where all the unused parts and rejected ideas for it went. But Mulligan Stew can hit the spot sometimes, and at the very least you can expect flavor. That’s what you get…

Read More Read More