Playing All 50 States: Is It Possible?

The idea surfaces in the way most ambitious golf projects begin: casually, over a drink, during a round, in the gap between thinking about the game and playing it. What if you played a round in every state? All fifty. Not the best course in each state, necessarily, but at least one round, one scorecard, one entry in the log that confirms you put a tee in the ground from Maine to Hawaii, from Alaska to Florida.

The answer is yes, it is possible. People have done it. But the logistics, the timeline, and the cost separate the fantasy from the execution, and understanding what the project actually requires is worth examining before you start mapping routes.

The Easy Thirty

Roughly thirty states present no meaningful obstacle. They have public courses, available tee times, reasonable green fees, and airports or driving routes that make access straightforward. The eastern seaboard from Maine to Florida is a continuous corridor of golf. The Southeast and Southwest are thick with options. California alone could consume a month.

These thirty states are the body of the project. You could play them in a series of regional trips over two to three years, combining golf with family vacations, business travel, and the occasional solo detour. The green fees across these states range from $30 at a small-town municipal to $695 at Pebble Beach, and most fall between $50 and $150.

The Tricky Ten

A second tier of states requires more planning. Wyoming, Montana, the Dakotas, and parts of the inland West have excellent courses but fewer of them, longer drives between them, and seasons compressed by weather. North Dakota's golf season runs roughly May through September. Wyoming's high-elevation courses may not open until June. Alaska has courses, but the combination of travel cost and limited season narrows the window considerably.

These states reward the golfer who is willing to build a dedicated trip around them rather than treating them as stops on a broader itinerary. A road trip through Wyoming, Montana, and the Dakotas in July hits multiple states in a single week and crosses through some of the most visually dramatic landscape in the country. The golf is secondary to the scenery in some of these states, and that is perfectly fine.

The Hard Five

Five states require genuine commitment.

Alaska: Courses exist, primarily around Anchorage and Fairbanks. The season is short but the summer days are impossibly long. An 11 PM twilight round in June, under sunlight that refuses to quit, is an experience unique to Alaska. Moose Creek Golf Course in Fairbanks and Anchorage Golf Course are functional options. The green fees are modest. The flight is the expense.

Hawaii: Easily accessible and home to extraordinary courses. Kapalua Plantation on Maui and Mauna Kea on the Big Island are among the best resort courses in the country. The challenge is cost: flights, lodging, and green fees that can approach $550 per round at peak. Hawaii is the most expensive state on the list, but it is also the most rewarding for the quality of golf and setting.

Rhode Island: The smallest state has fewer public course options than any other New England state, but they exist. Combine it with a broader New England loop.

The challenge is finding a course that justifies a specific trip rather than simply checking the box.

Delaware: Similar to Rhode Island. Baywood Greens, a well-regarded public course, is the standout option. One round, one state, done.

Vermont: The season is short and the courses are spread across mountain terrain, but summer golf in Vermont, with the Green Mountains as a backdrop, is genuinely appealing. Stowe Country Club and Green Mountain National are strong options. Combine with New Hampshire and Maine for a northern New England golf week.

The Logistics

A golfer playing one round per state, traveling by a combination of flights and rental cars, would need approximately:

Spread over three to five years, with some rounds combined with existing travel, the effective cost drops considerably. Many golfers will discover they have already played ten or fifteen states through normal travel, which reduces the remaining project to thirty-five states over several years.

The Standout Course in Each Region

The project is more rewarding if you aim for quality rather than mere completion. A few highlights across regions that are not covered elsewhere in our guides:

Instead of the nearest course to the airport, seek out the best public option in each state.

The Mountain West: Jackson Hole Golf and Tennis Club in Wyoming plays at 6,000 feet elevation with the Teton Range as a backdrop. Old Works in Anaconda, Montana, is a Jack Nicklaus design built on a former copper smelter site. Both are worth a dedicated trip.

New England: Bethpage Black in New York is the most famous public course in the Northeast. But Samoset Resort in Rockport, Maine, offers a coastal experience on Penobscot Bay that is more immediately beautiful, and the lobster dinner afterward is mandatory.

The Plains: Prairie Club in Valentine, Nebraska, is one of the most remote quality courses in the country, set in the Sandhills region with dunes that rival anything in Wisconsin or Oregon. The drive to reach it is considerable. The golf justifies the effort.

The Deeper Value

Playing all fifty states is not really about the golf. It is about seeing the country through a lens that combines sport with geography, that gives you a reason to visit places you would otherwise skip, and that creates a record of travel organized around a game you love. The round in North Dakota will not be the best round of your life. But the drive across the state to reach it, the small-town diner dinner afterward, and the memory of standing on a first tee in a place you never expected to play golf will accumulate into something larger than any single round at a famous course.

The project also reveals something about American golf that is easy to overlook from the vantage point of destination courses: golf is everywhere. Every state has courses. Every state has people who play them, maintain them, and care about them. The game is not concentrated at Pebble Beach and Pinehurst and Bandon. It is spread across the country in a way that reflects the country itself.

Is playing all fifty states possible? Yes. Is it practical? Reasonably, over several years. Is it worthwhile? That depends on how you define the question. If you are looking for the best golf in America, a curated list of twenty courses will serve you better. If you are looking for an organizing principle for a lifetime of golf travel, a framework that gives every trip a purpose and every round a place in a larger story, the fifty-state project is as good as any.