# The Best Golf Courses in Spokane

Source: https://thecourserankings.com/blog/the-best-golf-courses-in-spokane-wa/

[The Course Rankings](/)

Town Rankings / Washington


A leading golf course in Washington. Photo: Atomic Taco from Seattle, WA, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Spokane is the rare American city where the municipal golf is the story. Three strong city courses, ponderosa pines, basalt and river ground, prices that still make sense. Golfers from Seattle look at Spokane's public golf with genuine envy, and they should. A town that takes its city courses this seriously has made a choice about who golf is for, and Spokane made the generous one.

Against that public strength sits one private club of real standing, which sets up the only argument in this ranking. Does the members' course beat the best of the munis? We say no, and the course at the top of this list is a city course with a famous architect and a USGA past. Spokane golfers will not be surprised. Visitors should take note: the best golf in Spokane can be booked by anybody, and that is the finest thing about it.

## 1Indian Canyon Golf Course

Indian Canyon is a Chandler Egan design in ponderosa pines, and it hosted three USGA public links events, which tells you the national bodies looked at this municipal course and saw championship material. Egan was one of the great early architects in the West, a champion player who designed like one, and Indian Canyon is the proof that a city course can carry a serious design pedigree without sanding off its public soul.

The canyon ground does the dramatic work. Holes move through pines and across the broken terrain west of downtown, and the course asks for shaped shots and patience in a way flat municipal golf never does. It is the rare muni that good players travel to play and ordinary players can still get around. That combination is the whole argument for No. 1, and it is a strong one.

The concession is the municipal reality. Conditioning at Indian Canyon will not match a private club's budget in a dry August, and a course this popular wears its traffic. If conditioning were the ranking, Manito would win. It is not the whole ranking. Design, setting, history, and access line up on one side of this argument, and the city course takes the top spot in its own city. More towns should have this problem.

## 2Manito Golf and Country Club

Manito is Spokane's private standard: an established South Hill club with the conditioning, the pace, and the social gravity that the city's old families expect from their club. On a member's ordinary Saturday, Manito is probably the most polished golf experience in Spokane, and we will not pretend otherwise.

The golf is traditional parkland, well kept and honestly tested, a clear tier above the remaining city courses on presentation. What it does not have is Indian Canyon's architect, Indian Canyon's ground, or Indian Canyon's public significance. Private clubs usually win rankings on accumulated refinement. Here the muni's ceiling is simply higher.

The concession runs against Manito's own case in one more way. A Spokane golfer without a membership gets nothing from Manito's excellence. It is a fine No. 2, the best private golf in the city, and the course to join if joining is in your plans. It is not the best course in Spokane.

## 3The Creek at Qualchan Golf Course

Qualchan, the creek course, is the second city course on this list and the locals' favorite argument for promotion. Set in the Latah Creek valley south of downtown, it has the most overtly scenic ground of the city courses and a layout that uses the creek corridor to give the round a sense of journey the other munis cannot match.

It sits third because the test is a notch below Indian Canyon and the conditioning, while good for a muni, runs a notch below Manito. That is not a dismissal. Third here means a genuinely good public course that in many Washington towns would top the list outright.

The concession: Qualchan partisans who rank it first are voting for the day, and the day at Qualchan, creekside under the pines, is legitimately lovely. We rank the golf first. They rank the morning. Both ballots are honest, ours just has the creek at third.

## 4Downriver Golf Course

Downriver completes the city trio, a Riverside course along the Spokane River with the friendliest brief of the three: enjoyable, accessible golf in a pretty river setting, the course where Spokane sends beginners, families, and anybody who wants a round without a wrestling match.

Fourth place reflects the test, not the value. Downriver is the lightest golf on this list, and in a ranking it has to finish behind its stronger siblings and the private club. Its conditioning and its design ambitions are municipal-modest and it knows it.

Here is the thing, though. A city running Indian Canyon, Qualchan, and Downriver as a set has built a ladder a golfer can climb for a lifetime, from first round to serious test, all on public land at public prices. Downriver is the first rung of the best municipal ladder in Washington, and last on this list is a compliment wearing a disguise.

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