FRENCH WEST INDIES

Golf in Martinique & Guadeloupe

- Where to play

Thirty years ago, Robert Trent Jones senior was asked to design two 18-holes on Guadeloupe and Martinique islands. But both courses belonged to public communities which considered golf as a game just good for lazybones! Consequently they tried during years to return those lands to pasture instead of repairing the yearly climate damages caused by tropical rain after the hot season and . Today the successful development of golf resorts in other Indies islands has convinced them that golf could be part of tourist attraction and economic development.
To revamp greens and fairways at the Golf de la Martinique, the local management hired, Simon Valmy, a professional green-keeper coming back home after a few years at the Royal Mougins Golf Club in Cannes and in Guadeloupe, the community, owner of the Golf of Saint-François, decided to vote the means to put the golf club in good conditions to attract extravagant tourist golfers.

- in Martinique
The Golf de la Martinique is located at Trois Ilets village at 25 kms south of Fort de France, part of the beautiful bay, and is also an historical place as Joséphine Beauharnais, Emperor Napoleon’s wife, was born there at la Pagerie.
Built in 1976, on a land of 63 ha, the course espouses the hills sloping down from the top to the seashore. Robert Trent Jones Senior used his maestria to fit the course to the natural environment, hilly slopes, trees, water hazards or tortuous seashore. The course jumps from hills to shire or creek to creek over the sea like the hole 15 par-3. Some holes are in the forest and some others are mountain holes departing from the top or arriving on a top hill green with exceptional viewpoints over the bay. Many bunkers protect the greens and 14 holes have water hazards. This particular diversity makes it an interesting course to play but audacity could be frustrating. Stay humble!
Beginners as well as confirmed players can discover or improve the golf game at the David Leadbetter Academy which exists till 1996. Clubs and karts are available at the pro-shop. The club-house is well located on the hill and the restaurant serves golfers snacks or local tasty dishes.
Golf de la Martinique - 97229 Les Trois Ilets
Email : info@golfmartinique.com

- in Guadeloupe
The Golf de Saint-François is located at 27 kms from the International airport of Pointe à Pitre, at the eastern wing of the butterfly-shaped island where the trade winds can blow hardly. The place was a marsh and after filling in and cleaning up the quagmire, the land has been shared between the golf course on 53 ha and a short aerodrome for small planes (some people would like to recuperate it for a 9-hole? And some others would like to recuperate the golf to build a new airport?
On this flat area, Robert Trent Jones designed a flat course adding bumps, palm trees, bunkers and artificial lakes. He traced narrow fairways along water hazards in front of the main winds to make it more challenging as on holes 3, 4, 9, 15 and 18.
The club-house is a typical exotic cabane wich appeared on the TV screens of "Good Morning America" a few years ago when the personal of the Meridien Hotel was on hard strike. Even breakfast was not anymore available and customers came every morning to the club-house to get their scrambled eggs or croissants. Many American golfers still remind it confirming that a bad image lasts longer than all the good ones.
Golf de Saint-François - Avenue de l'Europe
97118 Saint François - Guadeloupe FWI
Email : golf.stfrancois@wanadoo.fr

Today as a matter of fact both clubs are proud to emphasize the growing figures of their golf players where teens are more and more numerous. So what about the future? As golf tourism is also on a developing trend all around in the Caribbean Islands, people talk about projects of "second" courses as well in Martinique (at Ste-Anne?) as in Guadeloupe (Basse Terre) but, nobody has been able to provide credible information about it.

General view of les Trois Ilets where stands the golf course.

Hole 15 along the bay

and its island green

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