The state of Ohio has contributed a great deal to the game of golf. It has bred tremendous players like Renee Powell, Jack Nicklaus and Tom Weiskopf, is home to architects such as Michael Hurdzan and Arthur Hills, and has hosted memorable US Open and PGA Championships and Ryder Cup matches. The state's golfing legacy extends to its public-fee courses, a diverse and accessible lot.

The warm air arrives a bit earlier and departs a bit later in Ohio. Golfers in the southern part of the state are known to play year round, never dodging snow flakes. A trip to the Buckeye state doesn't replace a late-November jaunt to Myrtle Beach or an early-March sojourn to Florida, but it is a viable option at any point in between.

There is a lot of golf to be played in the state that sits below Lake Erie, bordered by Michigan, Indiana, Kentucky, West Virginia and Pennsylvania. Closest to Ontario, a mere three hours south of the Niagara region, is the northeast corridor that links the upper counties to Cleveland and Columbus.

There is affordable and challenging golf during the 45 minute trip from the Pennsylvania border to metro Cleveland. It is the type of golf that provides a nice warm-up for the main courses found later. Our suggestion is to stop by one of these courses on your way down for a round to shake the cobwebs and loosen the muscles.

Before you get to Cleveland, there are five courses that you should consider playing for the championship experience. An eastward detour takes you toward Youngstown, with a stop at Fowler's Mill. Beyond Fowler's Mill, just north of Warren, is Avalon Lakes. Both courses are early Pete Dye layouts, with 27 holes at Fowler's Mill and 18 at Avalon Lakes. Although Lake County, Ohio lies farther north, this district might more deservedly bear the name. Both courses are distinguished by their nearly-constant access to creeks, ponds and lakes.

Heading back toward I-90, three courses in the town of Painesville certainly merit inspection. Two are accessible for guests of the Quail Hollow resort, meriting consideration as a day one-and-two base of operations. The resort brags of 36 holes designed by Bruce Devlin/Butch von Hagge and Tom Weiskopf/Jay Morrish. Both courses feature the ups and downs of this surprisingly hilly region, although ample fairway space cushions the challenges of the topography. Five minutes up the road is Little Mountain Country Club, eight years old and designed by the Columbus Ohio firm of Hurdzan/Fry. For Toronto area golfers, Michael Hurdzan was responsible for the Devil's Pulpit/Devil's Paintbrush duo north of the city, along with the heralded Wisconsin course Erin Hills, on the short list of potential US Open venues. Little Mountain offers the greatest challenge posed to date on this journey.

Arriving in Cleveland, the vast array of golfing options makes it clear that the city has shed all claims to the nickname "mistake by the lake." In Brian Huntley, one of its own, Cleveland has a golf architect whose body of work is developing into one impossible to ignore. Although he might soon become recognized on a national and international level, it is in his home region that his fame is most easily recognized. The Quarry (Canton), Deer Ridge (Bellville) and Shale Creek (Medina) are the three Huntley layouts ranked in GolfClevelandOhio's top ten, although Eagle Creek (Norwalk) and Links at Firestone Farms (Columbiana) follow close behind. First-time course designer Joe Salemi notched a double-eagle in his Boulder Creek layout, located in Streetsboro. Boulder Creek was recognized by national publications Golf Digest and Golfweek for its excellence.

The trip from Cleveland to Columbus, along I-71, takes about an hour and a half. You'll pass Firestone in Akron, home of the World Golf Council's Bridgestone Invitational, won recently by Vijay Singh. The premier course to play between the two cities lays in Nashport, near the Longaberger basket factory. Highly thought-of as producers of the nation's finest baskets, Arthur Hills arrived in the mid-1990s to build the acclaimed Longaberger Golf Club. Close on its heels is Eagle Sticks in Zanesville, a Michael Hurdzan layout completed to national recognition in 1990.

The capital of Ohio might as well be known as the capital of golf. Home to private layouts like Muirfield Village (the Memorial Tournament on the PGA Tour), Scioto (Jack Nicklaus' course as a youth) and The Golf Club (seminal work of Pete Dye), as well as championship public-access tracks like Cook's Creek, Golf Club of Dublin, Tartan East and Phoenix Golf Links, greater Columbus might just take a while to explore. Cook's Creek was the maiden design voyage of PGA Tour golfer John Cook and his family and lies to the south of the city. It utilizes the rolling farmland of central Ohio to create a course laden with undulations and mounding. The Golf Club of Dublin is Michael Hurdzan's Ohio tribute to Irish courses, situated in a most-unIrish landscape. In spite of its housing-development locale, it truly is possible to play GCD with a putter from tee to green.

Considering that the driving distance between the Pennsylvania-Ohio border and Columbus is a mere three hours, there is an extensive capacity for golfing memories in the Cleveland-Columbus corridor. High-end, mid-range and low-budget courses are available for golfers of all levels. Our suggestion is to establish two bases for your trip. Begin in the northeast area near Painseville and play three or four of the good ones on the trip down. Settle on a second headquarters between Mansfield and metro Columbus to avail yourself of the capital district layouts. Do not miss the Longaberger-Eagle Sticks double east of the city. Finally, on your trip back north, catch one or two of the tracks that you missed on the way down. You'll be singing the praises of the diversity of Ohio golf long after you return.

Best Ohio Golf Links

www.golfclevelandohio.com

www.ohiosgolf.com (use the "Maps" feature.)

Ronald S. Montesano directs buffalogolfer.com, the online guide to golf in western New York.