Our afternoon round on Saturday was at Pronghorn’s Nicklaus Course. As soon as I knew we were headed to Bend I booked a round for us here. There are two courses at Pronghorn – the Nicklaus Course, which allows public play, and the Fazio Course, which is private.

The Nicklaus Course – one of Jack’s signature courses – gets ranked among the top public courses in Oregon and it was one of the top-shelf Bend courses I was considering. I haven’t played Tetherow or Sunriver Resort yet, but hopefully one day I’ll be able to make a comparison!

I tend to enjoy Jack’s work so I had a suspicion that I’d like the Nicklaus Course. And, as expected, I sure did enjoy the round here. However, part of my enjoyment came from the unexpected desert landscape on the east side of Bend. After the tree-lined rounds at the other courses in Bend, I was very happy to swing freely here.

I think the most unique feature about Pronghorn is its setting, which is almost the complete opposite of the other courses closer to downtown. Pronghorn is about a half hour from downtown, located out in the high-desert of Central Oregon. When I think of Oregon I think of lush greenery, evergreen trees and endless rainfall. There is none of that at Pronghorn and instead what you’ll find is sagebrush, juniper trees and a mostly barren landscape. There are even some cool ghost trees that are integrated into the routing.

We played the black/rust combo tees which are 72.0/140/6731. The Nicklaus Course takes some time to get going with a solid – but not spectacular – front nine. The 155 yard par-3 7th was my favorite hole on the front. The green is large and angles from front right to back left. What makes for the nervous tee shot is the large false front and a massive collection area that is probably six feet below green level. When we played the pin was tucked in the back left corner!

If you stay patient then the back nine is where things get exciting, thanks to the rolling topography there and a couple short par-4’s. Once you hit the 12th hole then it is a fun stretch of holes to close out the round. Depending on what tees you are playing the 12th and 13th could be driven but there is plenty of trouble around each green. The 12th green is perched up in a rocky hillside and the 13th has water everywhere.

As you’d probably guess the course has some signature Nicklaus features. The fairways are large and quite forgiving, except for the fairway bunkers. Things get tougher from there with very interesting and difficult green complexes that are surrounded by more sand. The greens repel shots and the contour can feed shots closer or further away.

We paid $100 which is at the higher end of my usual price range, but in the Bend area I’d go as far as saying that Pronghorn is a good value. The facility is managed by Troon and the conditions were impressive. The fairways were cut short and I always had a clean lie. The greens were pure and quite fast. The bunkers were heavy, wet and didn’t fit with the rest of the maintenance.

While I’d recommend a round on the Nicklaus Course, I wouldn’t make a special trip to Bend just to play it. However, if you are in the area to visit or play golf then the Nicklaus Course should be high on your list of places to play.

Course Pictures (click any picture to scroll through the gallery):