Banff Springs Golf Course

The verdict

Banff Springs is the course every golfer wants to see in the Canadian Rockies, and it lives up to the photographs. Stanley Thompson, the greatest of Canadian architects, was given a site of almost absurd grandeur on the floor of the Bow Valley and built a course that opened in 1928 amid reports that it was the most expensive ever constructed. He routed it so the holes frame the surrounding peaks, with Mount Rundle, Sulphur Mountain and the castellated Fairmont hotel forming a backdrop that few courses on earth can match.

The golf is more than scenery. Thompson set his greens and bunkers with real strategy, the par 3s are world class, and the elevation and mountain air change how the ball flies. It is a resort course in the best sense, eminently playable from the right tees and unforgettable from any of them. For a traveling golfer, a round here is the centerpiece of a Rockies trip and an item ticked off the bucket list.

The holes worth the trip

The Devil's Cauldron is the hole the world knows. The par 3 fourth plays about 192 yards from a high tee down across a glacial pond to a green tucked against the sheer rock of Mount Rundle, the water an unforgettable jade green and the mountain rising straight up behind. It is regularly named among the finest par 3s anywhere, and it has recorded more holes in one than any other on the course.

It is far from the only great hole. Thompson uses the river and the rising ground to set up tee shots that must favor one side, and his bunkering is bold and beautifully shaped. The par 3s collectively are a clinic, each playing to a different point of the compass and a different mountain, while the longer holes reward a player who can judge how the thin mountain air carries the ball.

Elk and the occasional bear are part of the experience, and the round moves at an unhurried pace that suits the setting. Take a cart, take your camera, and give yourself time to enjoy a course where the architecture and the scenery are equally worth the trip.

Where to stay nearby

The obvious base is the Fairmont Banff Springs itself, the castle in the woods that gives the course its name, with hotel guests enjoying the easiest tee access and a short walk from room to first tee. The town of Banff a few minutes away adds a wider range of hotels, lodges and dining for groups who want more flexibility.

Banff Springs pairs naturally with the other Stanley Thompson jewel of the Rockies. Build a road trip that adds the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge course up the Icefields Parkway, and weave in the mountain courses of Canmore and the Bow Valley for a Rockies golf week framed by some of the finest scenery in North America.

Looking for a base? See our recommended hotels and resorts near Banff Springs.