The Rex Hospital Open Nationwide Tour Event is winding up today at Wakefield Plantation in Wake Forest, NC, just 10 miles northeast of Raleigh. I haven't played the course but judging from scoring over the first three days, the 7,257-yard layout cannot be too tough. Kyle Thompson leads by four shots with a total 198 (64-65-69). Indeed, from the 6,400 yard tees, the course rating is just 70 and the slope an accommodating 125.
Wakefield is a Tournament Player Championship (TPC) course and was designed by Hale Irwin for the PGA tour. The course is the tree-lined centerpiece of a 2,200-acre community that offers a full range of amenities in a popular area for both retirees and working families, given its close proximity to the famed Research Triangle Park. The community is also within an hour or so of Pinehurst and within 20 minutes of Raleigh/Durham International Airport, a major hub for American Airlines and other carriers. Three major universities - Duke, University of North Carolina and North Carolina State - are all within 40 minutes and offer a wide range of educational and entertainment options. Although major shopping and other conveniences are a few miles outside of Wakefield's gates, there are restaurants, banks, grocery stores and medical facilities inside the community. A major shopping mall with more than 140 retail outlets is just a few miles away.
Wakefield, which opened in the late ‘90s, offers a wide range of housing options, from golf villas to estate homes at prices that range from the mid $100s to over $4 million. A nicely landscaped four-bedroom, 4,500-square foot home on Pawleys Mill Circle seems typical at $540,000, although its lot size, at just a quarter-acre, puts it in close proximity to the neighbors. At the higher end, a 7,000 square foot, six-bedroom home with three garages on Wakefield Plantation Road is priced at $989,000 and is situated on just over a half acre. For those looking for an inexpensive condo in the community, a 4 BR, 2 ½ BA unit on Garden Knoll Lane might fill the bill at just $168,000.
Club membership is private. One of the benefits of membership is access to the other 23 TPC facilities nationwide. The TPC Wakefield web site has more information. If you are planning a visit to the area, please let me know (click on the contact button in the column above right) and we will arrange for you to meet with a real estate agent who knows all the best golf communities in the area. As always, there is no cost or obligation to you.
For those of us choosing to live where we can play golf year round, the US Department of Agriculture's National Arboretum - the government agency tasked with, among other things, figuring out what, where and when things grow - provides some guidance. Its Plant Hardiness Zone map speaks volumes about the idiosyncrasies of temperatures in the U.S.
The USNA's map separates the country into 11 "hardiness" zones, each one different by 10 degrees in average minimum annual temperatures from the adjacent zone. Zone 1 is the coldest, and includes northern Maine and the most northerly points in the upper Midwest. Zone 11, the hottest, encompasses very southern Florida. The map essentially reveals where golf can and cannot be played in the winter months.
Residents in northeastern coastal North Carolina, for example, live within the same band of average low temperatures as residents of El Paso, TX do. Cape Hatteras, NC (zone 8) is warmer in winter (47 degrees F average low in January) than is Dallas (46 degrees) and shares the same zone as Charleston, SC, which is a good six-hour drive south (and where all courses are open all year). Some locations in New Mexico share the same minimum temperature profiles as locations in Washington State. We've read advertisements for communities in the valleys of the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia and North Carolina that tout thermal idiosyncrasies that make their locations golf friendly in winter, even though ski areas are less than a mile away. After pondering the map, we believe it.
The upshot is that if climate and year-round golf are major considerations in your relocation plans - it is the major consideration for many - plant hardiness geography can help you map out the proper course.
For a view of the hardiness map, click here .
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