Seaside holes define over-the-top experience at Quivira Golf Club in Los Cabos

Dunes, cactus forests, seaside cliffs and the gleaming Pacific Ocean set the table for an over-the-top experience at Quivira Los Cabos but it's the Jack Nicklaus-designed golf course that elevates the resort and residential community to must-see status.

Nicklaus' inspired, if somewhat disjointed, routing here takes the golfer from the flatlands near the community's beach, the up into the cliffs and over into massive dunes before a return to relative calm.

This secluded, gated retreat is just a mile away from the heart of Cabo San Lucas, with its world-class marina, fishing, dining and shopping and features the best of the best in hospitality, golf and wellness.

The top-notch amenities includes a private beach club, a village center, sports parks, natural preserve and more than 20 miles of walking and biking trails, just to name a few.

Quivira Golf Club, which was named the Best New International Course by Golf Magazine, features more oceanfront holes than any other development in Cabo and some of the most exciting golf in North America.

"I've never seen any place that has three holes hanging out over the ocean like this golf course does," Nicklaus said. "They are unbelievable. This is a diverse golf course with inland settings; it's got desert, it's got ocean, it's got rocks. It has a little bit of everything."

The front-nine is par 34 with one par-5 and three one-shot holes, while the back-nine plays to a par of 38, offering three par-5s and just one par-3.

Some of the course's most dramatic holes - those set in the rocky coves a hundred feet above the pounding surf and those routed across the site's immense hills of sand - will eventually be a part of their own 18-hole course once the second track planned for the site is built.

For now, the golf experience at Quivira requires a cart ride of about 10 minutes between the fourth and fifth holes out of the valley up a snaking path and over a ledge. Once on top, the views of the valley below and the vast Pacific are magnificent.

The fifth hole has captured the attention of golfers around the world. It's a downhill, 310-yard par-5 that offers the ultimate risk-reward option of going for the green in one mighty blow. The tee is on a wind-swept point and the putting surface is on another spit of land some 50 feet below and hard on the ocean. Even a layup here is a challenge because the target is a rolling, narrow fairway from which a shot to the green is totally blind (a forecaddie is stationed at the far corner to guide golfers with their aim.)

The 180-yard sixth is also flanked on the left by the Pacific but after the challenge of the fifth hole, this shot seems like a piece of cake. As does the 148-yard 13th, which heads back to the south and requires a carry over a deep, rocky Oceanside cove.

In between the sixth and the 13th are six great holes that play across and over the huge dunes. This stretch includes the 222-yard par-3 ninth, and two of the three par-5s on the back-nine (the reachable in two 554-yard 10th and No. 12, a 635-yarder that ends right next to the beach where battle scenes from the movie Troy were filmed.

The final three holes are all par-4s of 478 yards of more, but two of those play downhill off of awesome elevated tee boxes.

The facility's thatched-roof clubhouse offers a large rectangular bar, a casual steakhouse and ample outdoor seating overlooking the sea. Beside the clubhouse is a spacious double-ended practice facility that parallels the ocean, as well as an elongated practice putting green and an expanded short-game practice area.

Quivira Golf Club is accessible to guests of the four Pueblo Bonito Oceanfront Resorts and Spas in Los Cabos, and to owners of properties in the community's Copala, Montecristo Estates Luxury Villas and Novaispania Residences.

Each of the Pueblo Bonito Resorts welcomes guests with luxury accommodations, fine dining and a host of on-site amenities. The Pueblo Bonito Pacifica Resort & Spa, which is set on the Quivira property, is right on the beach with complimentary shuttle service to and from Quivira Golf Club.

A trip to Quivira is one for the senses and is a must for any golfer looking for the finest of everything. I can't wait to get back there.