Boot Ranch, perched on a mountaintop in Fredericksburg, is for those with a taste and the budget for grandeur. Its innumerable views are stunning and panoramic, the golf course kicks major ass, the staff strikes just the right tone, the food and wine are so good they make you want more food and wine, and the hostelry is world class. Grandeur isn’t too grand a word to describe all of it.
If the Neiman Marcus Christmas catalogue had a country club membership in it, it would be to Boot Ranch.
“Yes,” I said to a passing waiter, affecting a suavity I seldom feel, “I believe I will have another smoked clam canapé with pear beurre blanc and roasted parsnips.” And yes again, a while later, to seared scallops encrusted in crushed macadamia nuts. And I believe I’ll wash it down with a glass of your Messina Hof Blanc de Bois Gulf white. Lovely.
Another detail that illuminates the whole is/are the giant Western red cedar beams supporting the ceiling in the men’s locker room. A local construction artist chiseled the timbers from logs shipped in from British Columbia. There are cheaper ways to hold up a roof—in fact, every other means of support would cost less—but these thick chunks of red wood give the room a delicious feeling of warmth and permanence. It’s like changing your shoes in a cathedral.
The soft light and quiet in the spa is as a cocoon.
The point is, when PGA Champion Hal Sutton developed the site—it opened in 2006–expenses were not spared. To begin at the beginning: 2000 acres of unusually gorgeous Texas Hill Country could not have been cheap. Then there’s that rough and tumble golf course. The thin layer of soil on the rocky substrate had to be augmented by many many truckloads of organic material. Immoveable boulders had to be dynamited or built around. Irrigation and drainage presented more challenges; in fact, every aspect of building a golf course in and around limestone and granite costs real money.
Sutton designed it. How did Hal do? The short answer is that Boot Ranch is a superbly made and maintained course. And it’s tough, as you find as you hit your first second shot. The banks above the bunkers attached to the green on number one look like furrowed eyebrows; even with an 8 iron in you hand, it’s a scary shot. It goes on like that all day: room off the tee, and shots to greens that induce shortness of breath.
The post card hole is the tenth, a driveable (for some) par four with a waterfall in front of the green. No, two waterfalls: ten busy streams slither down the top cataract, and three on the lower. That’s Hal’s house to the left of the fairway, and the Oz of the clubhouse over there. I don’t like this hole: because of two live oaks to the right of the green, the tenth at Boot Ranch offers a lot of risk but not enough reward. You could swat one over the canyon and the falls and find yourself stymied, and asking yourself why you bothered.
Otherwise the golf course is a lot of fun, and did I mention it is tough? The switchbacks and hills on the cart paths made me want to disconnect the governor on my E Z Go. And the paths provide a convenient tour of available building lots. As I told my new friend Andrew Ball, the Director of Real Estate Sales and Marketing, under the right conditions, I might be interested in Lot 102B. Incredible view from near the 14th tee. “Good choice,” Andy said. “I can get it for you for $600,000.” Let me think about it, I replied, again with the faked smoothness.
Yes: let’s talk about money. Golf memberships cost $100,000 and they’re vertical, a pleasing concept that means that if you join, your kids and grandkids and parents and grandparents are members, too. Social members pay $25,000 initiation. Lots run from 2 to 18 acres and from $300,000 to $2.5 million. One-eighth ownership of a Sunday house (you’ve got to see the Sunday house) costs $325,000 and includes a membership. The cozy Sundays stand alone around a large, luxurious common building that’s suitable for cocktail or any kind other kind of party.
There’s more at Boot Ranch I haven’t mentioned because I didn’t try them, such as skeet shooting, the pool complex, a hundred outdoor fireplaces, tennis, hiking, biking, and the wine cellar. All of it is grand, I’m sure.
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