Lakewood Club - Azalea Course

The Azalea Course at Lakewood Golf Club, the resort course at Marriott's Grand Hotel in Point Clear, Alabama, is an architectural palimpsest, with Perry Maxwell's original 1947 routing on holes 1-5 and 15-18 sandwiching a Ron Garl expansion (holes 6-14, completed 1983) and subsequent refinement by Bobby Vaughn. The 6,770-yard par-72 layout plays through centuries-old live oaks draped in Spanish moss, with dazzling azaleas in spring bloom and occasional swamp margins skirting several fairways. The back nine carries the stronger terrain, with more undulation and a memorable signature hole at the par-4 14th, its green set against a four-acre lake. Compared to the resort's companion Dogwood Course, Azalea is generally regarded as the stronger layout, with better bunkering, better routing through the property's natural features, and firmer, truer greens. It's a classic Southern resort round: not punishingly long from the tips, but strategic and beautifully conditioned for a Grand Hotel stay.