This is the story of three separate groups of golfing visionaries in the late 1980's. Each group was making plans to change the focus away from fishing in Baja Sur by creating the first 18-hole golf course. Shortly thereafter, these three groups of bold builders separately started to excavate the cracked, dry desert dirt. As they began to scratch the surface of their soon-to-be fairways, they looked up to see earthmoving machines rearranging areas of the cactus-laden landscape by other groups, also in pursuit of creating the perfect golf course. To their credit and for the betterment of Los Cabos, all of the groups held fast and built their own dreams of world class golf courses.

FONATUR, the Mexican government agency in charge of creating 'mega' projects, first studied the area of San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas in 1969 as a potential place to develop, to complement their other rapidly-growing areas like Cancun. A master plan was finally drawn up in 1975. FONATUR was certain that golf courses created with amateurs and tourists in mind was a necessary feature of their project and that nine holes were better than none. Thus, The Campestre San Jose del Cabo was finally open for play in June 1988.

Palmilla Golf Course got its start in early 1960 when Don Koll, a Newport Beach real estate developer, first traveled to Cabo to the Palmilla Hotel. In 1986, Don Koll continued his involvement in the project by purchasing the Palmilla Hotel and the surrounding beachfront and hillside. Mr. Koll had an opportunity to meet with President Carlos Salinas in 1985 and entered into an agreement to create a conglomerate consisting of Koll International, the Mexican Government and The Nicklaus Group to develop golf in Los Cabos.

The constructors of the Palmilla golf course broke ground in 1986 and it opened for play in November 1992. The final nine Ocean holes were ready in September 1999 and today Palmilla is the only 27-hole resort in Los Cabos.

Meanwhile in 1982, Eduardo Sanchez Navarro, heir to the Corona beer empire, set his sights firmly on over 3,000 acres of barren land situated in the heart of the corridor between San Jose del Cabo and Cabo San Lucas. At that time there were less than 400 hotel rooms in all of Los Cabos. This gently sloping land full of cacti, along with endless views of the ocean is now the master-planned area called Cabo Real Beach and Golf Resort. Today it is home to seven deluxe hotels with over 1,000 rooms and two world class championship golf courses.

Golf Digest has rated the Cabo Del Sol Golf Ocean Course as number 70 in the world. Of course, it hasn't always been this way, before 1983 it was just another piece of beautiful oceanfront property along the Los Cabos corridor. This was the second project created by Don Koll. Opened in May of 1994, it has played host to the Senior Slam in both 1995 and 1998.

Tom Fazio's Querencia opened in 2000 as the first private country club in Los Cabos. Los Cabos has some of the best courses in the world, a perfect climate and breathtaking scenery. At least six more courses are in some stage of planning, including the new Puerto Los Cabos.