Went to Tampa last week for the first time and played five rounds:

Day 1: Bardmoor - Typical florida golf. Flat, lots of water, slow and grainy greens, average conditions, not a bad course, but underwhelming. I shot 75 with no birdies (6 hdcp). $50

Day 2: World Woods (Rolling Oaks) - Very hilly and picturesque course. Beautiful. Reminded me of North Carolina or Georgia. Extremely slow greens. Below-average restaurant. Would highly recommend if you can stomach the drive, which was 2 hours each way from Clearwater beach. Fun. I shot 80. Putting was a joke, but I can't imagine it's like that all the time. $40 The greens on Pine Barrens were being topdressed, so we didn't play that one.

Day 3: TPC Tampa - Good design, fun and challenging course. Best conditions and amenities of the week, although conditions were still not superb (as compared to Arizona or the Midwest in the summer). First class joint. I shot 81. $100

Day 4: Lake Jovita North - Very hilly with ample room off the tee. Very fun course that should have been easier to score on but it had alot of difficult green complexes. Way out of the way (1.5 hrs each way for me). Great restaurant. I shot 82 (6 over on the par 3's). Fastest and truest greens of the week by far. South course was being overseeded, so I rescheduled Day 5's round to the Eagles. $50

Day 5: Started out at the Eagles, which has 36 holes. To be fair, we cancelled our tee time after about an hour of having lunch (which was good) and hitting balls into their aqua-range, which was fun but the balls and turf were terrible. Maybe it was just that day, but this place seemed like a golf factory. There were literally hundreds of golfers milling around (2 or 3 tournaments that day) and no carts available for an hour. Even without playing it, it was obvious that conditioning was horrible and the holes were all jammed together. Skip it. They did give us a refund, which I appreciated.

Still Day 5: We hightailed it over to Heritage Isles, which, again, was way out of the way. Decent course if you have limited options for some reason, but the green complexes were the most uninteresting I can remember. Designed so that the 25 handicapper can move along quickly. Slow greens. Very cool palm tree logos on the shirts. I shot an uninspired 82. $35

I had planned to play the top two courses at Innisbrook, but I found out too late that the Golf Channel booked up that entire week for an amateur tournament. I have gone on alot of golf vacations and have never encountered traffic as bad as in the Tampa area, with the possible exception of the Washington D.C. area. Way too much time was taken up traveling. If you go there to golf, don't bother to stay on the beach like we did. Picked up a nice Rife Antigua putter down there, which is really nice. (I am a putter addict.)

I am glad you had a good trip to Clearwater/Tampa. I lived there my whole life until last year when I transferred to Charlotte, NC. I have played all those courses numerous times. They are all exactly as you described, to bad you did not get a chance to play Pine Barrens or Innisbrook.

I can agree with you on the traffic, especially down by the beach. I was just there last week for a wedding. Hopefully you had a chance to get to Rockaway Grill for some food & drinks!

Being from Tampa, I can agree with your assessment. World Woods is a treat to play. As much as I enjoy the Rolling oaks course, the Pine Barrens course is a step or two above in terms of layout. Greens there seem to be in constant maintenance, unfortunately. It is ALL about the golf at that place, so the amenities are not up to snuff with many of the country courses.

TPC Tampa Bay is a fine course, and usually well-maintained. Pricey, but a nice experience.

As for the others, you experienced typical Central Florida golf. Too much play, not enough maintenance, courses set up to push as many golfers through with as little challenge as possible. Flat with sand and water with very little imagination in the layouts an slow greens. The Eagles is a travesty, IMO. Could be a fantastic course, but it is SO crowded and so poorly maintained that it is difficult to enjoy if you like to take the game and your score seriously. Now, if you are drinking some pops and hanging out with buds, then ANY course is worthwhile, I guess.

As for the traffic, you are catching the early season for the "snow birds" and traffic is always bad at and around the beaches. If you ever plan on coming back for another "Florida swing," I would recommend staying someplace like International Plaza (great shopping, food, and night life). It is walking distance from the Veterans Expressway (to get to World Woods, TPC, Heritage Harbor, Forrest Hills, etc.), I-275 (to get to Bloomingdale, Plantation Palms, Lexington Oaks, etc.), and SR 60 (to get to the beaches, Bardmoor, Innisbrook, etc.). It might make traffic a little more tolerable.

I would also recommend the Orlando route next time, and be sure to take in Champions Gate and Southern Dunes (among others). There are some very nice courses in that area.