Service or Great Service award in Places to Play; and that was located roughly within a two-hour drive of the city - US golf courses

Golf Digest, Jan, 1999

Then we went and stayed anony-mously and played at the resorts. Now we feel a whole lot better.

Escape from New York When you're tired of trying to get invited to one of those well-to-do clubs in Westchester County or the posher parts of New Jersey, it's time for a break. Hid- den among that ripple of hills in eastern Pennsylvania known as the Poconos is a well-kept secret called the Country Club at Woodloch Springs.

We left after work on a Friday night last fall, and the next morning I was off in the first group of the day with three locals. An early mist clung to the trees, then lifted to reveal a pine-scented playground in glorious autumn colors.

Our group combined to 13-putt the first. A lot of the greens-and indeed whole parts of the course-are tilted at alarming angles, as though there had been some terrible subterranean implo- sions during the night. Especially mem- orable are the par 5s-big sweeping affairs with vast elevation changes, sudden doglegs and forced carries.

One very irritating distraction during the round was the clouds of black gnats circling our heads and biting our ears. One member of our foursome, Eddie, had a solution: Put your hat on the end of a club and hoist it high above your head. I was skeptical. But it worked. For the remainder of the round, we resem- bled a platoon advancing through the jungle, our 3-irons held high like sabers.

The golf course makes for a fun day- trip from the city (it's 101 miles from the Lincoln Tunnel, according to my odom- eter). If you want to spend the night, you can rent a house near the course or stay at the original Woodloch Pines Resort two miles away.

The resort celebrated its 40th anni- versary in 1998, and in many ways it's still rooted in the good old days-days of cleanliness, godliness and irredeem- ably stodgy home cooking. Every day, there is a packed schedule of "activities":

10:30 a.m.: Adults only! Shuffle- board Contest.

4 p.m.: Trivial Pursuit Contest. All ages welcome to play! 8:45 p.m.: Join Ray in the North Lodge for Jackpot Bingo Games! We took an afternoon walk around the resort. In the 100-yard dining room, the waitstaff wore uniforms that looked like castoffs from some long-ago TV adaptation of a Dickens novel. We stumbled into a room full of octogenarians doing the conga. Later, we dressed for dinner (gentlemen are entreated to wear a jacket on a Saturday night). It's a world away from the city that never sleeps.

-JOHN BARTON Country Club at Woodloch Springs, Hawley, Pa. (717-685- 2100). Green fee $60-$75. Double rooms $125-$200.

L.A.: Natural highs at Ojai Greater Los Angeles has a voracious appetite for growth, devouring open land and spreading unabated across the Southern California landscape.

The seamless carpet of concrete is broken only when topography intervenes, which it has done on behalf of the Ojai Valley, surrounded by 5,000- foot peaks that stand sentry, denying passage to urban sprawl.

Traffic generally clogs the escape route, Highway 101 North from Los An- geles. Still, it is only about 90 minutes by car to this small, sparsely populated corner of paradise. The centerpiece is the Ojai Valley Inn, a 206-room resort and spa that boldly calls itself California's Shangri- la.

In the '50s, the Inn was a Hollywood retreat, catering to the whims of Clark Gable, Anthony Quinn and Joan Crawford, as well as Tracy and Hep- burn. Crosby and Hope came as well, not for its seclusion, but for its George Thomas-designed golf course. It opened in 1923, and over time be- came the hallmark of the inn, one that ultimately developed a rich golf history. Jimmy Demaret and Doug Sanders have represented Ojai Valley Inn as touring pros, and Demaret's brother, Al, once was the head pro.

Thomas, with an assist from Billy Bell and later Jay Morrish, squeezed the land in a way that urban sprawl failed to do. The golf course is tight, its holes fre- quently framed by mature shot-blockers of eucalyptus and oak.

It measures only 6,235 yards from the back tees, a misleading number given the tightness of most fairways. A variety of gorges, barrancas and streams threaten to ruin a day that can be salvaged by a visit to the spa and its diversity of services.

"Please," a brochure implores, "choose from the following items," which include a shiatsu massage, aromatherapy massage, even a pregnancy massage. Or you might opt for an elderberry herbal wrap, an Ojai honey scrub or a healing-hands facial.

At the end of the day, Los Angeles not only is out of sight, it is out of mind.

-JOHN STREGE Ojai Valley Inn, Ojai, Calif. (800- 422-6524, 805-646- 2420). Green fee $110-$120. Double rooms $210-$290.

Chicago: The little great lake Chicagoans don't need to travel two hours to see a lake or find a golf course, but they do it anyway. The trek north on I-95 and Route 50 to Lake Geneva, Wis., is a summertime tradition as deep- ly embedded in local habits as the famed brats and cheese of the Wisconsin Dells.

Geneva National is a sprawling resort located a few miles past the quaint "downtown" that abuts the lake. The facility advertises "45 holes of legendary golf"; that's 18 holes from Arnold Palmer, 18 from Lee Trevino and nine from Gary Player. Naturally, there is much discussion and comparison about the three.