The Morris CC is off I-80 at the Morris exit 60 miles west of Chicago on the north side of the Illinois River with its Nettles Creek track open to public play on the weekends only.
The Creek course has a wide open, prairie/links feel to it as it moves over slightly rolling topography within a residential community. There’s patches of tall prairie grasses throughout bordering the landing zones, six ponds, 35 sand traps, and generous, undulating and contoured green complexes. There’s tees from 5,059 yards to 6,562 yards off the back tees, the white tees play to 6,129 yards, 68.8/118, course/slope ratings, designed by Buzz Didier.
There’s so many recent lists of the most expensive rounds of golf in the United States like from Links Magazine, Bleacher Report, or the venerable Golf Magazine, yet none of which seem to have noticed Canyata. It may be because it’s certainly not in a high profile resort location, but in east central Illinois 20 miles west of Terre Haute, Indiana.
Canyata is an exclusive, private club completed in 2004 by the Forsythe Family with Gerald Forsyth the patriarch. The land is former farmland that’s been in the family for 150 years. Mr. Forsythe is known throughout Illinois and the Midwest as a philanthropist and entrepreneur as owner of the industrial Indeck Group as well as investments in sports and entertainment including another golf course in Illinois.
Cantata Golf Club
The course generates loads of superlatives for those who have been fortunate enough to play there: world class, amazing, immaculate, impeccable, perfect, luxurious. It will set you back $850 to play 36 holes, but that does include lunch and free range balls!The layout is classic parkland over rolling terrain of pastures, hardwood corridors, and along streams and ravines with bent grass from tee to green. The fairways average 50 yards in width, the greens 7,000 square feet, and mounding has created totally isolated and unique holes. It’s a challenging golf course with numerous tee boxes, the Blue tees play to 6,094 yards, 70.2/142, course/slope ratings, designed by Michael Benkusky.
Fairways was designed by one of the luminaries of golf course architecture, Perry Maxwell.
Maxwell was a partner with Alister MacKenzie until MacKenzie’s passing in 1934. They collaborated on Melrose CC, Crystal Downs, The University of Michigan Course among others. Maxwell individually, is known for Southern Hills, Prairie Dunes, and the Old Town Club with redesign assignments at Pine Valley, Augusta National, and Colonial.
He was in the minimalists club of architecture where using the land as it is was as paramount as keeping costs down. He carefully sculptured the greens in generous size with undulation and swales as his trademark. He was also the first to introduce “greens” which were previously browns, or oiled greens utilized in the Great Plains region where most of his work resides.
Fairways Golf Course is one of Maxwell’s more simplistic designs given the topography and environment he had to work with. It’s a little over an hour from the Loop and an hour west of Oakbrook just off I-88 in Rochelle.
The layout is a classic parkland design over generally level terrain and easily walkable. The fairways follow narrow, mature hardwood lined corridors leading to raised greens with 24 sand bunkers mostly green side. There’s a creek running through three holes on the north side and a pond in play on a couple of holes. It’s a drill of the short game with 8 par 3s and a total yardage of 4,649 yards, par of 66, 64.4/104, course/slope ratings.
With over 50 of the best golf courses in our guide that you can play as rated by the national golf periodicals in the Chicagoland area, we missed one. Although it’s part of a 36 hole private club, public play is permitted on the weekends on their Creek layout.
The Morris CC is off I-80 at the Morris exit 60 miles west of Chicago on the north side of the Illinois River with its Nettle Creek track open to public play on the weekends only.
The Creek course has a wide open, prairie/links feel to it as it moves over slightly rolling topography. There’s patches of tall prairie grasses throughout bordering the landing zones, six ponds, 35 sand traps, and generous, undulating and contoured green complexes. There’s tees from 5,059 yards to 6,562 yards off the back tees, the white tees play to 6,129 yards, 68.8/118, course/slope ratings, designed by Buzz Didier.
Atkins Golf Club at the University of Illinois
Illinois Athletics Facilities
The Atkins Golf Club, a slight reconstitution of the former Stone Creek Golf Club, is opening to public play on June 4. Not to be confused with the Orange and Blue 36 hole university course on the south side of town near the airport, Atkins is actually located on the southeast side of Urbana.
The Stone Creek course was deeded to the University as a gift from the Atkins family. It comprises a total of 300 acres including the golf course and land for future development with a value of over $15 million, so naming the course Atkins is fairly reasonable.
The layout winds through an upscale, residential development along contoured fairways over generally level terrain. There’s water hazards in the form of lakes, ponds, and streams in play on over half the holes plus 55 waste, pot, and conventional sand bunkers defending the fairway and greens. There’s four sets of tees from 4,956 yards to 7,118 yards at the tips, the white tees are 5,842 yards, 68.3/118, course/slope ratings, originally designed by Tim and Dick Nugent with a renovation by Drew Rogers..
