Time to Add a Resort in the Ozarks to Your Golfing Bucket List

Pebble Beach. Whistling Straits. Bandon Dunes.

And … the Ozarks?

A stupefying lineage of links legends have teamed up to anoint Big Cedar Lodge, an outdoor-oriented resort in Missouri’s southwestern Ozark Mountains, as America’s next great golfing destination.

Owned by Bass Pro Shops CEO Johnny Morris for over three decades, Big Cedar has long been known for its fishing offerings. But it’s no stranger to the greens, either, having operated the Tom Fazio-designed Buffalo Ridge Springs (formerly Branson Creek) for the last five years.

Those operations, though are about to exponentiate.

Big Cedar’s got two par threes in the works: a 13-hole course designed by Gary Player called “Mountain Top,” and a dramatic, lake-facing, Jack Nicklaus-designed course called “Top of the Rock.” In a region known for vast sky vistas and rugged, rocky terrain, each course figures to offer lovely views while you hack your way out of bunkers the size of your backyard. 

But wait: there’s more. Tiger Woods’s first public access course, a par-72 called Payne’s Valley, is on track to join the others in 2019.

See you in Missouri.