Muskoka Bay Club: This standard bearer for Ontario's immensely popular Muskoka golf region, offers a thrilling golf course as well as luxury overnight accommodation. The expansive roaming layout combines abundant natural features with dramatic elevation changes and breathtaking vistas. Ruggedly beautiful holes are characterised by prodigious rock ridges and outcroppings, as well as wetlands and ponds. All this surrounded by quiet pristine forest.

After much rock-blasting, tree-clearing, earth-moving and sand-topping, the pride of Muskoka emerged as a dramatic and challenging layout. Its two nine-hole loops are not for the faint-hearted, or for those who like to finish a round playing the ball they started with. Every hole is innately beautiful, but also intimidating. Whether looking tee-to-green, or the reverse, the interplay of pristine woodland and wetland, highlighted by rocky outcrops and stunning wavy-edged bunkering ensures each hole carries its own "wow" factor.

Amongst the dramatic and visually intimidating array of holes, the par-4 9th (Narrows) funnels up between rocks to a blind green. There's also a couple of blind drives to make, as at the par-5 12th (Alps). For most of the time you hit out from wonderfully elevated tees with a clear view of the hole ahead. Clear as the view might be, your nerves may still jangle as you size-up the attendant bunkering, rock features, water and wetland. A wonderfully varied collection of par-3s includes the upturned pudding-bowl 11th (Bad Baby) and seriously water defended 17th (Waterloo).

Muskoka Bay embraces just about everything you'll find on other Muskoka courses ... and then some. The immaculate playing surfaces are wonderful to behold, provided you can stay on them. Stray too far offline and dense unforgiving vegetation and woodland awaits. Whether you come away thinking "beauty" or "beast" may just depend on how straight you can keep things, especially from the tee.

At this Stay & Play venue, the on-site accommodation is located close to the golf facilities.