Anthony Kim's girlfriend, Lisa Pruett, couldn't bear to watch her man hit his tee shot on the final hole of the PGA Tour's Kiwi Challenge in New Zealand.

Pruett gazed off to the right of Cape Kidnappers' 480-yard, par-4 18th hole, watching a flock of sheep doing what sheep do best, munching on grass. She needn't have worried -- Kim blasted one down the middle. And when all eyes weren't on Kim, or the man he was tied with, Hunter Mahan, they were fixed upon the mind-blowing cliff-top scenery at Cape Kidnappers.

As with its sibling to the north, Kauri Cliffs, Cape Kidnappers is a long way from anywhere in the U.S. -- but as TV viewers in mid-November will undoubtedly confirm, it is truly worth the journey -- if only once.

    Cape Kidnappers, a 2004 Tom Doak design, is ranked No. 41 on GOLF Magazine's Top 100 Courses in the World -- but is easily Top 10 when it comes to eye-candy views. The back nine in particular boasts a sequence of staggeringly dramatic holes, starting with the tiny seaside par-3 13th, and peaking with the 650-yard, par-5 15th, which falls away on both sides of the fairway and sports a horizon green that's perched precariously on a bluff overlooking the sea.

Only the brave -- or the foolhardy -- will fire aggressively at a back pin. Still, it's not the silly grin-inducing aesthetics that elevate Cape Kidnappers, it's nature's fairway contouring and architect Doak's virtuoso skills in designing green complexes.

Adam Scott found out the hard way at the driveable par-4 14th, a 348-yarder. With the hole cut behind a wild swale, Scott found himself in no-man's land after a 290-yard poke to the left edge of the fairway. His full-swing flop shot flopped, landing over the green -- and basically dead. Two chips and two putts later, Scott carded a double-bogey 6.

Cape Kidnappers is full of these interesting green complexes. It's that design sophistication and the imagination called for in the short game that catapults Cape Kidnappers from merely a beautiful layout into a course that demands all the shotmaking skills you can muster.

With a hotel on-site called The Farm, that personifies the term "rustic elegance," Cape Kidnappers delivers a vacation experience second to none. If your butt can cope with a 13-hour flight from L.A., get it -- and the rest of your body -- to New Zealand's Cape Kidnappers. If you're a true course connoisseur, it would be a crime to miss this one.

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(Photo: Cape Kidnappers)