From Seoul to San Diego: Golf, Wine, and Three Great Tables
They flew in from Korea for business. They stayed for a bespoke golf vacation.
A lot of my favorite trips start this way. The work week wraps up, and someone asks: what if we stayed a few more days?
So we built it: a custom wine tour to kick things off, three days of golf, and dinners at some of San Diego’s most renowned restaurants. No tour bus or cookie-cutter itinerary, just a plan built around them.
First stop: Escondido wine country
We didn’t start with golf. We started with wine.
We hit three small wineries in Escondido, including Speckle Rock Vineyard. I’ll admit I was a little nervous, because these two are serious Napa Valley Cab drinkers. San Diego wine country isn’t Napa. Turns out that was the appeal. Nobody was rushing us, and we got to talk with the people who actually made what was in the glass.
It’s a bit of a drive inland, but worth the effort, and an easy way to ease into three days of golf.
Three courses, the whole picture
Most visitors come here wanting Torrey Pines. They try to get on both the North and South, and call it a trip. Torrey’s great. But there’s a whole lot more to San Diego golf than Torrey. At Local Knowledge, we give travelers a cross-section. This group played three, and each one told a different story.
Balboa Park. The locals’ course. Muni rates, downtown skyline over your shoulder, and the same regulars who’ve been teeing it up there for decades. No pretense. Just challenging golf in the heart of the city. Don’t let the green fee fool you. It’s short on the card and long on trouble: tight fairways, canyons, sidehill lies, and small greens that punish a loose iron. Good players walk off humbled. It’s the real hidden gem of San Diego golf. If you want to know how San Diego actually plays, start here.
Torrey Pines South. The big stage. Two U.S. Opens, including Tiger’s 2008 win on a broken leg. Sandstone cliffs, hang gliders drifting overhead. Every golfer who comes to town wants this one, and it lives up to it. There’s nothing like crossing a course off the bucket list. Standing 300 feet up on the edge of the cliff, looking out over the Pacific, never gets old for me.
Maderas. The finish. Luxury from the bag drop on. Immaculate conditioning, canyon holes, elevation that makes you stop and take a picture before you hit. It’s North County at its best, and a top course for a reason. Every time I play it, I’m impressed.
Muni, major championship, private-club polish. Three courses, three sides of the same city.
Playing with the group
I don’t always get to play. This time they invited me to join them at Maderas.
First, the clubs. One of them carried a handmade set from Itobori, forged in Japan the way samurai swords are, and built to custom specs. I’ve seen a lot of golf bags, but I’d never seen anything like these.
It was over 100 degrees out there. Both husband and wife put up a strong showing, with plenty of good shots. But Maderas doesn’t hand out pars. Hazards are everywhere, and some are flat-out unfriendly. The course was in great shape, and that made the day.
Golf is a shortcut to knowing people. Spend four hours on a course and you learn more than four business dinners would teach you. You find out who’s competitive, who laughs off a bad hole, and who quietly grinds over every putt. The language barrier never really came up. A good shot sounds the same in Korean and English.
Where they ate
Golf trips live or die at dinner, and these two ate well.
The Marine Room. La Jolla. Tables right on the sand, waves hitting the windows at high tide. It’s been a San Diego landmark for decades, and it still earns it.
Mr. A’s. Twelve floors up in Bankers Hill. The whole city laid out below, planes gliding past on approach to Lindbergh Field. It’s the best view in town, and it isn’t close.
Nobu Coronado. The newest spot on the list, with Nobu’s food and Coronado’s setting. A good way to close out the trip.
Why I do this
After 25 years of corporate life, this is the rewarding part. I meet people from all over the world and get to play a real role in their trip. It’s only a few days, but while they’re here, we really get to know each other.
They notice the TLC: the tee times, the tables, the small details that make a trip top notch. Different languages, same obsession. I get to hand them the version of San Diego that took me 20 years to find.