From the heights of the Beau Rivage Casino Hotel in Biloxi, Mississippi, there are expansive views of Biloxi’s Back Bay and what most still call the Gulf of Mexico. At 346 feet and 32 floors, the hotel is the tallest building in the state.
But then, except for the Regions Plaza office building in the state capitol of Jackson, four of the top five tallest buildings in Mississippi are casinos. In fifth place is the Golden Moon Hotel Casino at the Pearl River Resort in Philadelphia. And whatever one’s luck on the gaming floors of each property, the sure bets are on the ground, at the golf courses near the casinos.
Bound for Biloxi
Mississippi may be land-locked on three sides, but to the south there are 62 miles of scenic coastline. “If you want to golf and gamble you can go to Las Vegas. But you can’t go to the beach there,” said Pattye Meagher, director of communications for Coastal Mississippi. “The coastal people here are rooted in the water; you talk about fresh catch, the seafood you eat tonight was caught this morning.”
Meagher was aptly saying this at Field’s Steak and Oyster Bar in Biloxi, ensconced in a restored 1847 building once called the Magnolia Hotel, after the state flower. It’s well worth a stop, especially if you’re staying at the virtually-across-the street Beau Rivage as many do.
The Gulfport-Biloxi International Airport is the second largest in the state, and about 800,000 visitors fly in each year. Some of them come in on the MGM Air Charter Program, which the Beau Rivage uses to fly in customers from over 90 U.S. cities in some 500 flights a year.
The Beau Rivage celebrated its quarter-century of operation last March, the earliest of the now dozen casinos spanning coastal Mississippi. So it has height, heritage, and not a few restaurants of its own, 13 to be precise, along with four bars and lounges, a 1,550-seat theater, a retail shopping promenade, and an 85,000-square-foot gaming area that includes full-service sports betting. The house take no doubt contributed to the recent $55 million refurbishment of the hotel’s 1,733 rooms and suites. The spa was also refreshed and rose to a No. 5 ranking on the 2024 Spas of America annual list.
As for high rankings, the golf courses soar right up there, too. Fallen Oak, a Tom Fazio design, is exclusive to Beau Rivage guests. Golfweek selects the course as the “Best Course You Can Play” in the state, and the number two casino course in the country. This is about as sure a bet as you’ll find anywhere since the course is ranked right behind Fazio’s Shadow Creek Course in Las Vegas, but with a green fee about $1,000 less.
You’ll need special permission to play from the 7,487-yard tips, but why would you want to, when there are four other saner choices? Even from the shorter tees at 6,133 yards, the course comes in at a hefty 133 slope rating, which may require some post-round time at the expansive bar overlooking the tenth and eighteenth holes and having what some consider the world’s best Bloody Mary.
More than a thousand oaks, magnolia, pine and other native hardwood trees were transplanted around the lush 510-acre grounds when the course opened in 2006, to fairly immediate acclaim, hosting the Champions Tour Mississippi Gulf Resort Classic for ten years. Considering that 130 rounds played would be a busy day on the course, it’s always in superb condition.
In its last year, then known as the Rapiscan Systems Classic, the Champions Tour event was held at the Grand Bear Golf Club, a Jack Nicklaus signature design from 1999. Also nearby is the Shell Landing Golf Club, a Davis Love III design from 2000. Both are also on the top ten Golfweek “Best You Can Play” list, and are natural beauties in serene settings. “Grand Bear is the only course I know of that has its own greenhouse,” said general manger Brad Kale, where the kitchen staff are currently harvesting lettuce for the clubhouse sandwiches. Kale and his superintendent have even been taking beekeeping classes in hopes of establishing some colonies.
Shell Landing is named not after seashells, but tortoise shells, hence the various tee names—Snapping (the tips, at 7,024 yards), Hawksbill (6,010 yards) and others. The Love design was softened somewhat in 2022 when architect Nathan Crace redid the bunkers. So the Hawksbill tee, for example, came down to a reasonable 120 slope rating. Rounds at these and other courses in the area, even if not specifically aligned with casinos, can easily be set up through them, and they add to the luster of the coast’s golf destination bona fides.
The Philadelphia Story
In the Choctaw language, Bok Chukfi Ahithac means, “The creek where the rabbits dance.” Hence the Dancing Rabbit Golf Club in Philadelphia, Mississippi, two courses built upon the ancestral home of the Choctaw, about three hours north from the coast.
The courses are actually a few miles from the Big and Little Dancing Rabbit Creeks, which were an assembly ground on the ancient Choctaw tribal lands. The sad fact is that another dubious historical treaty stripped the tribe of its land rights in 1830, some 11 million acres, and most of the old Choctaw nation was removed to Indian Territory, now Oklahoma.
A few persistent members remained and they now make up some 11,000 members of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians, the state’s only federally recognized Indian tribe (who prefer to be called Native Americans), spread around 33,000 acres in eight communities in Mississippi and some trust land in Tennessee.
The Pearl River community (Bihhi Ayasha—“the place where mulberries are”), is the largest of the eight, the site of Tribal government headquarters and the resort, which it owns and operates. Not only are there two golf courses, but two casinos. Only one water park: the Geyser Falls Water Theme Park.
The Silver Star Hotel and Casino opened in 1994 and proved so popular it expanded five times in five years. In 2002, the dramatic architecture of the Golden Moon Hotel & Casino debuted, adding 70,000 more square feet of gaming space to Silver Star’s 90,000. It’s pretty easy to place a bet at Pearl River.
If you choose the wrong teebox out at Dancing Rabbit, easy might not be the operative word. Both courses—The Azaleas and The Oaks—can be both beauties and beasts. Both were designed by Tom Fazio and 1976 U.S. Open winner Jerry Pate. With Augusta National the clear model, there’s a grand sense of breadth, fast and extremely challenging green complexes, exquisite landscaping, plenty of diversity and elevation changes, though somehow every hole on the Oaks course manages to play downhill, or so it seems.
There’s a serene sense of isolation among the heavily wooded courses. The Azaleas opened in 1997, and the Oaks in 1999. Each is on Golfweek’s “Best Casino Courses” list and “Best You Can Play in the State” top ten. The Oaks seems to get a slight nod over its sister course, though it’s a shade more difficult. From mid-tees the Oaks (6,641 yards) slopes at 136, the Azaleas (6,537) at 130.
Whatever similarity there may be in their design is shook up by the use of different grasses, the Azaleas with ultra-dwarf Tif Eagle greens with Bermuda fairways, the Oaks with Champion Bermuda on the greens with Zoysia fairways. “We redid the greenside bunkers last year and later this summer and fall we’ll tackle the fairway bunkers,” said general manager Collins Billy.
The clubhouse at Dancing Rabbit also has facilities for overnight stays, if not bunking down across the street at the casino properties. Either way, the resort makes it pretty easy to check off a series of one’s favorite vices in a single day.