Location: Cedar, MI 20 minutes northwest of Traverse City Address: 4600 Club Drive Yardage: 6,734 from back tees Architect: Arnold Palmer Design Year Opened: 1998 Phone: 231.228.6000; 888.656.7572 Web Site: manitoupassagegolfclub.com

Over the past two decades some of the most distinguished new golf courses in America opened in Northern Michigan. The nationally acclaimed golf course architects who designed them found the beauty of the hills, forests and dunes to be the ideal for golf. Nowhere is this beauty more pronounced than in Leelanau County.
With its crystal clear lakes, sparkling Lake Michigan beaches and miles of dunes in the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, Leelanau was the perfect setting for Arnold Palmer to create one of his signature designs. Although never quite completed, it opened as the Kings Challenge Golf Club in 1998.

When a group of golf devotees lead by Bob Kuras, president of The Homestead Resort, purchased the course last year, they did so with the goal of creating a destination course featuring exceptional playing conditions and unmatched service. The group brought in the Arnold Palmer Design Company, Peridian International and the Wadsworth Golf Construction Company to assist with the renovation efforts.

Since the mid-1960s Palmer has put his stamp on more than 200 courses. Peridian has done the land plans and landscape architecture for some of the finest resorts in the world. And Wadsworth, the pioneer of the modern golf course construction industry, has built or rebuilt more than 800 courses.
The Palmer and Peridian plans envisioned scores of changes. Examples include the repositioning and squaring off tee-boxes, widening landing areas, renovating bunkers and lengthening some holes. The most dramatic (and most talked about) changes will be found on what are likely to be the signature holes.

Poorly conceived tee-boxes, a hazardous cart path and the improperly graded landing area were replaced on hole No. 8. The new tee-boxes, which are located some 50- to 120-feet above the green, step decisively down the face of the ridge. The vantage point lends dramatic views of the Par 5 and distant views of the Manitou Passage.

No.17 had tee-boxes with limited views of the features and a cart path that was too steep and far too visible. The tees were replaced, a landing area was added, the bunkers were completely rebuilt and native grasses were sown. At the same time, the cart path was rebuilt to relieve the grade and rerouted so that it is now all but invisible from the tees or green.

Complementing the golf course work was a complete renovation of the clubhouse. It now features stone and cedar shakes outside a clubroom, grill and golf shop inside.

There’s a new destination course in which to tee it up in Leelanau County – Manitou Passage. Visit them at www.manitoupassage golfclub.com.