• Wolf Laurel Country Club | Mars Hill, NC

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Wolf Laurel Country Club

Located atop one of the highest ridges in all of Western North Carolina with elevations over 5,000 feet is Wolf Laurel Country Club in beautiful Madison and Yancey Counties, North Carolina.

Wolf Laurel Country Club members enjoy some of the most spectacular views and challenging mountain golf in the eastern U.S. The Wolf Laurel Country Club is located only 27 miles north from Asheville, NC, one of America’s most celebrated destinations and only 29 miles south of the Tri-Cities, Johnson City, Bristol and Kingsport, TN.

“We believe Wolf Laurel is the most beautiful development in the Carolina’s; and because we have worked with nature and not against it, it is the best place to build a mountain home.”

Fondren Mitchell, one of the first developers, late 1960’s

Wolf Laurel History

The history of Wolf Laurel can be traced back to the mid 1960’s when 5,500 acres were purchased from the David Buck estate, Raleigh English and H. Lee and David McDaris by the Bald Mountain Development Corporation. A golf course, ski slopes and building sites were in the original plans and exist today. Bald Mountain, elevation of 5,516 feet, was the catalyst for the beginnings of what is now Wolf Laurel. The Bald Mountain area’s possibilities as a resort were recognized as far back as the Civil War, when Major General J.T. Wilder (Confederacy) had the idea of building a resort hotel and golf course. He was unable to acquire the land, so instead, built a summer resort on Roan Mountain, “Cloudland” and was operational from the 1870’s until 1939. Bald Mountain escaped the glacial encroachments of the Ice Age where vegetation from the Pre-Glacial era can be found. Currently, Big Bald is within the domain of the Appalachian Conservancy.

Wolf Laurel’s name is derived from the abundance of Mountain Laurel that existed on the Watershed and for the large packs of grey wolves that roamed the area. The wolves have been extinct since the 1920’s and 1930’s.

“The single reason that Wolf Laurel does better than other mountain developments, is because you can barely tell it is there.” - Fondren Mitchell.  And how true this remains today! The Wolf Laurel Country Club golf course was designed by W. Bruce Lewis. Mitchell goes on to say, “There is no golf course like this one.” It is one of the highest golf courses east of the Rockies with a back nine elevation average of 3,875 feet and the front nine elevation average of 4,300 feet.  In 1991 the nines were reversed.

Wolf Laurel has been known for decades as the “Great Escape,” and to this day, nature lovers and golfers are Escaping to its Elevation to Enjoy some of the coolest temperatures in the south for enjoyment of golfing, hiking, horseback riding and much more.