Priest Lake Golf Course

Priest Lake sits in the far northern Idaho panhandle, about as remote as golf gets in the lower 48. The lake itself — one of the clearest and least developed large lakes in the American West — draws visitors who come specifically to be away from things, and the golf course fits that spirit entirely. The surrounding landscape is dense boreal forest, the kind dominated by western red cedar, white pine, and tamarack, with the Selkirk Mountains providing the backdrop.

A par-72 layout in this setting almost certainly plays through timber corridors where errant shots disappear quickly and tree management becomes as important as club selection. Courses in this region of Idaho tend to reward patience and local knowledge over power, and the short summer season — snow can linger into late spring at this elevation — means the course plays at its best in a fairly narrow window from late June through September.

This is golf as an extension of a wilderness vacation, the kind of round where you're as likely to spot a deer or osprey as you are to make birdie.