# The St. Augustine Golf Guide

Source: https://thecourserankings.com/blog/st-augustine-fl-golf-guide/

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Town Guides / Florida


A golf course in autumn foliage. Photo: Famartin, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

The Hall of Fame is gone from World Golf Village, and the golf did not leave with it. That is the useful fact about St. Augustine. The museum chapter closed, the buildings got quieter, and two good public courses kept taking tee times five minutes from the interstate. Add the oldest city in the country down the road for dinner and you have a trip that works even for the golfer traveling with people who do not care about golf at all.

Anchor the trip on King and Bear. It opened in 2000 and remains the only course co designed by Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus, a line that sounds like a brochure until you play it and start arguing about which half you just played. Local telling has Palmer's Florida lakes style on the front and Nicklaus parkland on the back. At par 72 and over 7,200 yards from the back tees, it is plenty of course, and it hosted the Liberty Mutual Legends of Golf on the senior tour. Play it in the morning, from tees that match the group in front of you rather than the group on television.

## Two courses, one village, no wasted driving

Slammer and Squire is the natural second round. Bobby Weed designed it with Sam Snead and Gene Sarazen consulting, it opened in 1998, and the name is theirs: Snead was the Slammer, Sarazen the Squire. It is known for risk reward short par 4s and water guarded greens, and it asks for a different kind of nerve than King and Bear. Where the anchor course rewards length and patience, this one dares you on the short holes. As a pairing it is the best argument for staying at World Golf Village: two distinct rounds, minimal driving, and an evening in St. Augustine proper when you are done.

The third round should leave the village. St. Johns Golf and Country Club, a Clyde Johnston design opened in 2001 near World Golf Village, runs public and semi private at public pricing and serves as a popular tournament venue in St. Johns County. That tournament use matters for a visitor. The course is used to competitive setups and visiting groups, and it gives the trip a round that feels like local golf rather than resort product. Royal St. Augustine Golf and Country Club fills the fourth slot as the in town option, the round you add when the group wants one more morning of golf without turning it into an expedition. Keep expectations plain for both and you will enjoy them for what they do well: available tee times, honest tests, and a shorter bill than the village courses.

## Order, season, and access reality

Everything on this itinerary is public or semi private, which is St. Augustine's quiet advantage over richer Florida towns. No member needs to rescue this trip. Book King and Bear first because it drives the dates, pair Slammer and Squire on the adjacent day, and put St. Johns or Royal St. Augustine on the day you also want hours in the old town. Golf in the morning, the fort and the narrow streets in the late afternoon, dinner after. That rhythm suits the place.

Northeast Florida gives you a long season. Winter and spring are the prime window, summer means early tee times and afternoon storms, and fall is the underrated slot, warm water, thinner crowds, and courses that have recovered from the summer. Hurricane season is a real planning factor for autumn trips, so keep cancellation terms in mind when you book lodging.

One more practical point. World Golf Village sits outside the old town, so a car is part of this trip, and morning tee times pair better with afternoons in St. Augustine than the reverse. Book the village rounds first, then let the in town golf fill around your dinner plans rather than competing with them. The old town rewards an unhurried evening, and golfers who rush back for a second round tend to remember the driving better than either course.

The mistake visitors make is treating King and Bear and Slammer and Squire as the same course with two names, then playing only one of them to save money. The saving is small and the loss is the whole point of the village. They were built as a pair by different hands with different ideas. Play both, argue about the Palmer and Nicklaus halves over dinner in the old town, and let the empty Hall of Fame building sit there as proof that good golf outlasts the exhibits built to honor it.

**Reader responses are open.** Please cite a specific hole, a price, or a round you have played.