A tí me encomiendo...

Golf de Seignosse is a spanking new, state of the art course down the road from the quaint little bourg of Seignosse... We received a warm welcome at Seignosse from Philippe Pourrere, the manager, who after several years working at Club Meds in the Caribbean has met his share of New Yorkers, whose speech patterns he delights in imitating. Natalie Potier, who runs the large, modern clubhouse, speaks French, Spanish, Basque, English and some German. If you rent clubs at Seignosse, you may not find a driver in your bag because, as Natalie will tell you, it's "not necessary." We found out exactly what she meant when we played the course.

Seignosse demands pinpoint accuracy off the tee as the narrow fairways lined with mounds thread their way through pines and wizened cork trees, with trunks scarred by years of cork harvests. The course climbs sharply uphill on the ninth, offering a sweeping vista of the Landaise forest. The tenth is a steep dogleg right that is followed by a drive from a crow's nest of a tee to the par five 11th hole. Seignosse reflects von Hagge's emphasis on what he calls "vertical expression," using pines and mounding to create an interplay of light and shadow.

A few miles north of Seignosse, the unprepossessing hamlet of Moliets is the setting for Golf de la Cote d'Argent. Opened in 1988 as part of a new resort development, it's an exhilarating seaside course that careens across the Atlantic dunes. Moliets is a spacious links layout, in contrast to the secluded, sepulchral pines of Seignosse. Designed by Robert Trent Jones and Cabell Robinson, the former head of his European operations, the holes are separated by savage stretches of Landaise gorse, spiky broom, or genets, bushy evergreens and clusters of cork, with honeycombs of bunkers gouged out of the rolling fairways.

Robert Sidorsky. The New York Times. 1993