RISING FAWN, Ga. – The 18th hole at McLemore in northern Georgia isn’t for the faint of heart. Just as its altitude might trigger a response in anyone afraid of heights, the golf hole itself requires plenty of strategy and fearlessness off the tee and from the fairway.
Designed by Rees Jones and Bill Bergin, the 435-yard par 4 sits on a cliff’s edge 1,200 feet above the valley floor below. Telling golfers to stay right on the hole would be silly and obvious, because it’s perfectly clear that any kind of pull or hook off the tee will send a ball off the cliff’s rocky face into the forest below. It’s a stern test on one of the most scenic sites for a golf hole anywhere in the game.
The rest of the course climbs even higher from that cliff, providing views for miles across a valley full of farms and barns – on a clear day it’s possible to see more than 50 miles as the mountains continue to rise to the northeast. And the closing hole offers the best of those views – have your camera ready on the drive from the 17th green to the 18th tee.
McLemore sits at No. 5 in Georgia on Golfweek’s Best Courses You Can Play list, making it a can’t-miss in a stacked golf state. And as the property is located near Lookout Mountain within an easy drive of Atlanta and Chattanooga, Tennessee, McLemore provides a great escape into the beginnings of the Appalachian Mountains.