Bali High

I am playing Bali High on Friday. I will give you guys an update afterwards. This will be the first time I have played that course. Have any of you played it? I have heard it is a difficult course and grossly overpriced but not much beyond that. A friend of mine is taking us out on Friday so the price couldn't be better lol.

My buddy played it a few years ago on comp with his director of golf (he works at a course in Summerlin). He thought it was a decent course IF it was located miles away from airport flight patterns AND had a driving range. For that price I don't want to warm up hitting balls into a net! Ken Van Vechten recommends playing Siena instead since the same designers give you the same shot values for less than half the money. On a separate note, for those who might care, it's a Billy Walters course.

Good Luck!
Ric at Joes

Ric, was I that gentle writing up that overstuffed, overpriced place??? lol

No Ken it was another friend. That was actually my locals buddy. If I remember correctly, your advice to anyone that wanted to play Bali Hi, was to play Sienna which had the same designers and same shot values at a far lower price. I remember preopening bluster by Billy Walters about taking care of locals only to open the course with locals paying the same $275 or $300 as anyone else. He quickly added a nominal locals rate, but didn't gain a lot of locals support as the result.

Good Luck!
Ric Joes

We had a great time playing on Friday. I couldn't agree more about the driving range being a net. The auto ball feeder is cool but doesn't make up for the lack of a range. I guess when you are paying millions for land on the Strip you have to figure out the value of the range with a net vs the full range. Other than it being grossly over priced and no full range I didn't have any complaints. Honestly, there are too may beautiful courses here that are great bargains to play this course again. Also, I am not a Billy Walters fan at all so I will be sending my golf dollars elsewhere.

The course did look very nice on Big Break Las Vegas years ago, but I can't see playing under that airport traffic. Billy Walters made his bed long ago with locals. On each city or county course he built, promise was made to take care of locals only to open without said deals until public outcry forced him to give locals a deal.
He just always seems to push everything to the limit. His company does do a lot for Opportunity Village though, which is nice.

Good Luck!
Ric at Joes

the best value for Bali is to sell it eventually for real estate development. I can hardly believe with the cost of water in vegas to water this course that it makes much money. Wife and I stopped out and "thought" about playing, changed our minds after constant airport noise above!
We decided to play elsewhere.

As far as I know, courses in LV use gray water for their grass areas, which is significantly cheaper. A few years back clubs were mandated to cut back on grass areas not directly related to golfing. My buddy works at Red Rock and I think he said they cut their water bill back by about 35%, which translated to over $300K in savings. They still pay a ton, but it's a lot less than it would have been.

Good Luck!
Ric at Joes

Did not know if it was rumor or fact. Someplace around 6 -7 years ago I had read or heard that Bali Hi's water bill was $900K.The figures you mention make me think that was pretty close to the cost to water for Bali Hi! Damn, with the real estate taxes being located on the strip and the water tab not sure how they make any money!

That's probably in the ballpark. When Red Rock was still just 18 holes, Bob said their water bill was around 1 million a year. This would have been about eight years ago or so.

Good Luck!
Ric at Joes