Driven to distraction
Dramatic elevations, roaring water - and soon brilliant foliage - await golfers at the award-winning Sugarloaf and Sunday River courses in Maine
 Players survey a tee shot against the backdrop of Bigelow Mountain on the 11th hole at Sugarloaf Golf Club. (Ron Driscoll/Globe Staff) |
CARRABASSETT VALLEY, Maine - As we drove into this village late on a summer evening, we spotted a deer on the shoulder of Route 27. Nothing noteworthy there, except that the deer was staring into the woods, oblivious to our vehicle as we passed just a few feet away.
We thought of that deer a lot over the next couple of days, every time we found ourselves hopelessly distracted from the task at hand by dramatic scenery that we couldn't pull ourselves away from.
There we would be, holding a golf club, staring at the roaring Carrabassett River, and suddenly we would realize that it was our turn to hit an approach shot. Or we'd be roused from wondering exactly where the Appalachian Trail crosses the mountain range that provided the backdrop for our tee shot on a dramatic, downhill par 3.
Concentrating on your game isn't about to get any easier on two of Maine's most spectacular venues, Sugarloaf Golf Club and Sunday River Golf Club. Over the next few weeks, the players' canvas will be rendered in brilliant shades of orange, red, and yellow.
"The scenery kind of explodes in front of you," says Bill Swain, Sugarloaf's communications manager. "And the air is crisp, so you can see forever."
Neither course requires an injection of autumn color to provide a memorable round. Both are complex and challenging. But it is impossible to separate the courses from their settings, and it is undeniably the rugged Maine landscape that has brought fledgling Sunday River immediate honors, and helped Sugarloaf become what many consider the finest course in New England.
Both courses were designed by renowned architect Robert Trent Jones Jr., and both sit astride ski resorts; they even refer to each other on their websites as sister courses. But in playing them on back-to-back days as we did, you won't be confused about which course is which.
"Sunday River is set on an expansive hillside, while Sugarloaf is in a wooded valley," said Alex Kaufman, the communications manager at Sunday River. "There's no doubt that you have more challenge off the tee at Sugarloaf, but Sunday River gives you as much of a test as you could want around the greens."
Sugarloaf has been a fixture in top 100 US public course rankings since it opened in 1985, and the New England Journal of Golf rates it No. 1 in the region. In 1997, Golf Digest placed it in the top 10 in the nation for "memorability and aesthetics." But it still leaves first-time players agape when they get to the 10th tee, which begins a stretch of six holes that Jones dubbed the "String of Pearls" for the way they wind around and across the Carrabassett.
Number 10 is a short par 4, only 334 yards from the back tee. But it drops dramatically to a fairway protected by a bevy of bunkers. If you manage to negotiate that shot, you are left with a tough pitch shot to a narrow green between sand traps in front and the river behind.
After putting out, you cross a bridge and climb one of the steepest hills you will ever find on a golf course to the 11th tee, where your task is to hit a green about 190 yards away and 128 feet below you. That's right, the tee is the equivalent of a 12-story building above the target, though you'll still be dwarfed by Bigelow Mountain (elevation 4,145 feet), perched behind the green.
From the dizzying height of the tee, the green seemed pitched toward the river on its left, and it wasn't until we again reached ground level that we realized how much room there is to its right. Jones kindly left a bail-out area on the hole, which is aptly named "Precipice."
Course founder Peter Webber tells a story about people who live 15 miles south in Kingfield finding golf balls on their land in spring, when the Carrabassett overflowed into farm fields. We hope they are able to make use of the ones we sent sailing into the river from the 11th tee.
Sugarloaf's key features are the gushing river and those woods that frame each fairway and sometimes swallow off-line drives or force the player to maneuver shots around or over them. The stands of pine, oak, maple, and white birch begin their spectacle in mid-September, says Swain.
"It all happens pretty fast," he says. "In the last two weeks of September, we get the reds and the oranges, and in the first two weeks of October, you see more of the yellows from the birches. And by October 21st, we'll be closed, all buttoned up for the winter."
The logical way to play both courses is to first visit Sunday River, which is about an hour closer to Boston. You can be on the tee by noon after the 3 1/2-hour drive, stay the night, then make the 90-minute drive to Sugarloaf for a late-morning tee time the next day. If you can play a third day, Belgrade Lakes Golf Club is just over an hour south of Sugarloaf on the way back to Boston.
"We're not next door," said Webber, who worked with Jones on Sugarloaf, then helped get the ball rolling at Sunday River. "It's got to be something special to get people up here."
If Sugarloaf is the established star player in this twosome, Sunday River is the rookie with strong early notices. It opened its full 18 holes just last year, and Golf Digest and Travel + Leisure Golf both had it in their top 10 new courses. Golfweek immediately christened it No. 1 in Maine.
Sunday River's fairways are much wider than Sugarloaf's, though that isn't always apparent from the tee. Its topography is rumpled, with lots of hillocks and plateaus making the targets seem narrower than they are. The enormous greens provide strategic challenges and tricky club selection because of their size.
The views of the Mahoosuc Mountains are expansive and include Old Speck, the fifth-highest peak in the state at 4,144 feet. The Appalachian Trail runs just west of Old Speck, which is part of the panorama for the downhill tee shot on the 4th hole.
"The foliage starts with the deciduous trees at the 3,000-foot level, and then it just makes its way down to about 800 feet," said Kaufman. "So somewhere on the mountain it's always going to be changing color."
Our only encounter with wildlife on the courses was with a woodchuck on the 12th tee at Sugarloaf, though one of our early morning playing partners at Sunday River, Chris Coates, showed us a camera-phone shot he had taken of a moose on the course's access road.
The ski resorts were acquired last month by CNL Income Properties, a real estate investment trust, and Boyne USA Resorts will operate them. Boyne also operates the Bretton Woods and Loon resorts in New Hampshire. Sugarloaf's course is part of the resort, while Sunday River's is a separate entity, owned by Harris Golf Group of Bath, Maine. Neither Swain nor Kaufman expects big changes because of the sale.
So which is the better course?
"Sugarloaf has been on the radar for quite some time," said Kaufman. "They're really two different experiences. We're just trying to get the word out that we're here."
Consider the friendly competition a draw, or more properly, a win-win.
Ron Driscoll can be reached at rdriscoll@globe.com.
