Golf La Sainte Baume Est. 1988

Nestling in a valley alongside the Domaine de Triennes vineyards, Sainte Baume provides an enjoyable golf outing in a natural and wonderfully rural setting. All around you the wooded Provencal hills provide a scenic backdrop, while a spectacular limestone mountain ridge, part of the Massif de la Sainte Baume, rises up to the south, reaching a height of over 1100 metres (3600 feet). With a much smaller ridge running across the golf course, the well-maintained layout here contains plenty of undulation, creating several testingly elevated tees and greens. At times relatively open, at others more tree-lined, the course lays down an array of golfing challenges as it sweeps around the largely hidden Hotel du Domaine de Chateauneuf. Care will be needed on five or six holes where water threatens next to the greens. There are one or two blind drives to make, most especially at the par-5 15th, which is played up and over the ridge, while at the equally challenging par-5 12th the demand is for a well struck drive from a gloriously elevated tee box. The greens here are often large and sloping, with the bunkering occasionally set too far back to be a threat, unless your approaches are seriously offline. The clockwise back-nine is arguably stronger than the anti-clockwise front-nine, although both are flanked by picturesque countryside, and both enjoy their share of the better holes. The double dog-legging par-5 7th and well-bunkered, downhill par-3 16th are two of the most memorable.