Blue Canyon Country Club (Lakes Course)

Blue Canyon Country Club's Lakes Course is the club's second 18-hole layout, sitting near the airport at the northern tip of Phuket Island — it's a public course built in 1999, playing to a par 72 over 7,129 yards, with a rating of 74.0 and a slope of 128. Like its sister course, it carries the Yoshikazu Kato signature: the celebrated Japanese architect began shaping the property in 1988, working around the site's existing canyons and woodland while leaving the natural terrain largely intact. The routing reflects that history. Creeks and water-filled canyons — remnants of the area's old open-cast tin mining — thread through the holes, with the jungle's original contours mostly undisturbed. Lakes and canyons frame the outward nine, while the inward half moves through rubber tree plantations. Five tee options stretch the course to suit everyone from scratch players to weekend golfers. Accuracy off the tee counts for more than length. A number of approach shots have to carry small creeks or canyons that cut across the fairways, so finding the green in regulation depends on getting a clean lie from the fairway. The course's standout long par-4 is a good example — only the longest hitters can reach it in two, and most golfers do better playing short and avoiding the rough canyon growth in front of the green. Course quality took a big step forward after a full renovation in 2006 that upgraded the layout further. The result has closed the gap with the Canyon Course — once seen as the "younger sibling," the Lakes Course has grown into a strong course in its own right since the rebuild, and some visitors even rate it as the better test of the two, thanks to fewer blind shots and a more honest, straightforward challenge. Green fees include cart use, and the caddie experience rounds things out well: while facilities show some wear, they remain perfectly serviceable. The caddies most who have been there for many years are veterans of the course, knowledgeable and good company.