Featured Golf Trip: Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail

In the late 1980s, the CEO of the Retirement Systems of Alabama decided to diversify the state pension fund’s portfolio by employing Robert Trent Jones Sr. to build a multi-city, multi-terrain, multi-experience golf trail across the state. From that wild idea grew one of the first options for a cohesive golf trip packed with variety—and stitched together under singular ownership.

Although the destination golf scene has since grown exploded, today the Robert Trent Jones Golf Trail still stands as a testament to consistency and value. Its original eight courses have ballooned to 26, encompassing 468 holes, with greens fees generally sitting somewhere between $50 and $125, sometimes a touch more.

In a lot of ways, the trail is a sort of entry point to more logistically complex trips, a cross-state excursion with the gutter bumpers of a cohesive infrastructure that, for the most part, has already done the work of mapping routes and compiling prices and figuring out things like accommodations.

There’s probably an existing package or itinerary fit for your group regardless of the number of people in it, the length of your vacation, your preferences for accommodations, and how many holes you plan to play. And if there isn’t, the trail will work with you to put one together. Packages start around $100/day for golf and lodging.

Any list of the best public courses in Alabama is littered with RTJ—Golfweek grants the trail with four of the state’s top 5: Grand National (Lake), Ross Bridge, Capitol Hill (The Judge), and Oxmoor Valley (Ridge). Interestingly, it’s the Links course at Grand National that’s the state’s only track to crack a top 100 publics list, sitting 98th at GOLF mag.

But that’s further proof of something that makes the trail so appealing: If the rankers have trouble putting their finger on which of the 11 tracks are best, you probably will, too. And that fires the mind as you move from woodsy to linksy to water-guarded golf, and from the very northern tip of the state (The Shoals) to the Mobile Bay (Lakewood Club). The lengths between will be filled with friendly debate and banter among buddies as you try to make sense of your own preferences. Of course, in truth, the trail is less about what’s “best” and more about the whole buffet.

Pricing details

Overall range (golf + lodging): $550 – $1,600
• Assumes five days, four nights.

​Golf: $350 – $800
• Greens fees generally range from $50 – $125, with a few select courses higher.

Stay: $200 – $800
• Stay-and-play available.

​Travel considerations
• Your airport will depend on how you sequence the trip, but the chart here shows drive times to and from each course.

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This piece originally ran in the GTG newsletter. Subscribe here for free and get pricing details alongside the weekly featured stop—plus news on openings, redesigns, and more—in your inbox each Thursday afternoon.