A Midsummer Night‘s Golf Dream

June 8, 2005

Blame it on the latitude. Or the time zones. Here on Michigan’s northwestern coast, the summer days really do last almost forever.
On June 21, for instance, the sun won’t go down on Northern Michigan until 9:32 p.m. – 20 minutes later than it goes down in Detroit, half an hour later than Cleveland or Cincinnati, and more than an hour later than Chicago. And since the summer dusk in these northern latitudes lasts for another half hour, it’s often possible to read a newspaper (or smack a golf ball) until nearly 10 o’clock.
Coupled with an equally early sunrise (just shy of 6 a.m.) that translates to almost 16 hours of daylight during the year’s longest days – a fact not lost on the thousands of golfers who make their way annually to the region known as Michigan’s “golf coast.” The glacier-sculpted courses in the region are popular even on ordinary 12-hour days, but the prospect of a 16-hour golf marathon makes some players wax positively poetic.
“It is so cool to be able to play all that golf in a single day, to squeeze every drop of golf you have left in your tired frame,” say J. Michael DeAgostino of the Grand Traverse Resort and Spa. “The chances are good that you’ll run out of balls before you run out of daylight.”
Five years ago, the Grand Traverse Resort and Spa decided to capitalize on the area’s overabundance of summer illumination with a promotional event called “Golf Your Daylights Out.” The idea was a simple one: offer golfers a chance to play unlimited golf from sunrise to sunset for a single reduced fee – just to see how many holes they could play on the longest day of the year.
The price was right: $95 per person for what could reasonably amount to three rounds of golf on all three of the resort’s courses – The Bear (designed by Jack Nicklaus and home to the Michigan Open), The Wolverine by Gary Player and William Newcomb’s Spruce Run -- where it’s not uncommon to pay $140 for a single round. This year, a dozen of the area’s major courses are offering “Golf Your Daylights Out” specials, and the event has been expanded from a single day to four days – Monday, June 20 through Thursday, June 23.
At the A-Ga-Ming Golf Resort, for instance, a flat fee of $79 covers unlimited dawn-to-dusk at both The Torch, A-Ga-Ming’s original four-star course, and its new Jerry Matthews course, Sundance, which opens for the first time that week. Likewise, a $65 fee pays for 16 hours of play at the windswept Champion Hill Course and its neighbor, Pinecroft, while a $65 fee covers a day at High Pointe, designed by Traverse City’s own Tom Doak.
For $75 players can enjoy 16 hours of golf at King’s Challenge, designed by Arnold Palmer, while $65 guarantees a long day’s play at Mistwood Golf Course, another Jerry Matthews/Ray Hearn course, and $59 will purchase unlimited rounds at The Leelanau Club at Bahle Farms or The Crown Golf Club. With 16 hours of daylight and 12 different courses to choose from, local course managers assume there will be plenty of opportunities for even the greediest player.
“I wouldn’t think we’ll get so many players coming out that we won’t be able to accommodate them all pretty easily,” said Dave Taberski, general manager at The Crown.
Massive dunes and moraines left behind some 8,000 years ago by retreating ice sheets give the Traverse City area a distinctive landscape of long hills, narrow valleys and iridescent lakes that has attracted generations of golfers here. Golf Magazine calls it “America’s summer golf capital,” while Golf Digest awarded it the Number Twelve spot on its list of the world’s Greatest Golf Destinations.
More information about golf in the  Traverse City area can be found in the new 2005 edition of the Traverse City Convention & Visitors Bureau’s Golf Guide. The 36-page booklet features detailed descriptions of local courses and a listing of local hotels and resorts that offer specially priced packages for golfers.
To request a free copy of the new Traverse City Golf Guide, call the Traverse City Convention & Visitors Bureau toll-free at (800) TRAVERS or log on to the Bureau’s Web site at www.mytraversecity.com

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