Baytowne Golf Club at Sandestin

Baytowne Golf Club at Sandestin is a resort course within the Sandestin Golf and Beach Resort on Florida's Emerald Coast, designed by Tom Jackson and opened in 1984 with a comprehensive renovation by the same architect in 2005. The par-71 layout plays to 6,804 yards and features some of the only significant elevation changes on any golf course in the Destin area, with a front nine of heavily bunkered pine-tree corridors and a back nine that exploits the site's terrain changes for dramatic views of Sandestin property.

Baytowne Golf Club is one of four golf courses at Sandestin Golf and Beach Resort, the 2,400-acre resort and residential community spanning Walton County on Florida's Emerald Coast between Destin and Miramar Beach. The course was designed by Tom Jackson and opened in 1984, making it one of the resort's earlier golf offerings and one of the first courses Jackson built on the Northwest Florida panhandle. Tom Jackson, a Florida-based golf course architect who was particularly prolific across the Southeast during the 1970s and 1980s, designed Baytowne as a course that exploits the natural topography of the Sandestin property.

The design is notable for being the only golf course on Florida's Emerald Coast that extends from the beach to the bay — stretching from the Gulf of Mexico side of the resort toward the Choctawhatchee Bay. This routing creates one of the few courses in the panhandle region with genuine elevation changes, as the terrain between the Gulf frontage and the bay interior features gradients unusual for Florida's typically flat landscape. Jackson's design divides the Baytowne routing into two distinct personalities.

The front nine plays through a pine tree-lined corridor of approximately 3,300 yards, heavily bunkered and shaded by the tall longleaf pines characteristic of the Northwest Florida ecosystem. The back nine takes full advantage of the site's elevation changes, producing approach shots and tee views of the Sandestin property and bay that distinguish Baytowne from the flat, open resort layouts more commonly found in central and south Florida. In 2005, Tom Jackson returned to Baytowne to renovate and modernize the course he had built two decades earlier.

The renovation updated bunkering, turfgrass, and infrastructure while preserving the routing and natural character Jackson had established in the original design. Sandestin Resort's four-course golf program — which includes Baytowne alongside the Links, Burnt Pine, and Raven courses — serves both the resort's vacation visitors and the residential community of more than 10,000 property owners who live within the Sandestin gates. Baytowne's position as the course that best captures the pine-and-bay character of the panhandle landscape makes it a distinct experience within the resort's comprehensive golf offering.