Gauteng Golf Holiday Guide (South Africa)

Dec

Gauteng Golf Holiday Guide (South Africa)

Posted by Guest Author | Posted in Travel | Posted on 16-12-2009

The Best Courses in Gauteng - Silver Lakes Golf Estate

Although Gauteng is the smallest province in South Africa, it is the financial capital and industrial hub of the country. 31 Gauteng golf courses are ranked within the Golf Digest top 100 golf courses for South Africa, and Gauteng is the main golfing hub of the country. Gauteng also has a wide selection of other tourist attractions, and is therefore the ideal destination for a golfing holiday.

A Gauteng golf holiday offers the golfer a wide variety of top rated championship golf courses which will challenge the amateur and professional alike. Because of its ideal year-round climate, golf can be played throughout the year in Gauteng. The favorable South African Rand exchange rate is also attractive for tourists coming from Europe or North America. The price of accommodation, restaurants and golfing green fees are a fraction of what one would pay in the United States or in Europe when converted to dollars or euros.

Many of the golf courses in Gauteng have been designed by some of legends in golf, such as Jack Nicklaus, Gary Player, Greg Norman and Ernie Els. Many European PGA Tour and South African Sunshine Tour golfing events have been hosted at Gauteng golf courses. Any Gauteng golf holiday should include the following courses:

Glendower Golf Club – Rated as the top golf course in Gauteng, and is one of South Africa’s most challenging and beautiful golf courses. Glendower has hosted many South African open tournaments and is one of the oldest golf courses in the country. A must play for any golfer visiting Gauteng.
Royal Johannesburg Golf Club – ‘Royal’ contains two 18-hole courses which are considered two of the best parkland courses that Johannesburg has to offer. Rated as South Africa’s 8th best golf course, the challenging, but spectacular ‘East’ course has also hosted many South African open tournaments. Royal Johannesburg’s ‘West’ course offers a slightly easier, but a totally different type of golfing challenge, and is also ranked within South Africa’s top 30 courses.
Blair Atholl Golf Club – Recently opened in 2008, Blair Atholl was designed by Gary Player and it is predicted to become one of Africa’s top golf courses.

If you want to obtain more information about the courses in Gauteng, go to the Gauteng golf directory provided by GolfLinx.

Besides its world class golf courses, Gauteng has many other attractions. Gold Reef City is a reconstruction of Johannesburg during the gold rush era, and is built around a functioning gold mine. The golf mine gives visitors the opportunity to view the process of mining gold, as well as the opportunity of taking a trip down an old mine shaft. Besides the gold mine, Golf Reef City has a brewery, a Victorian fun fair, pubs, hotel and tribal dancing.

The famous Cradle of Humankind, 50km southwest of Johannesburg, is a strip of dolomitic limestone caves containing the fossilized remains of ancient forms of animals, plants and most importantly, ancient human fossils. There are more than three dozen fossil-bearing caves, with some of the ancient ape-man fossils dating back 2.3 million years.

Visitors wanting to see the Big Five, which are Elephant, Lion, Leopard, Rhino and Buffalo, can visit several excellent nature reserves and game parks situated around Johannesburg and Pretoria. There are many other tourist attractions in Gauteng besides the few mentioned here to keep you busy whilst you are not on the golf course.

If you want to find and book accommodation within Gauteng, have a look at the Gauteng accommodation guide provided by GolfLinx.