[Frank Pont]

Six new courses added after a short trip to Bordeaux/Biaritz:

Chiberta - Simpson. Great course, unfortunately a lot of building activity around the course. Also conditioning of the course could be improved a lot.

Chantaco - Colt. One of the lesser quality Colt courses I have played. To be fair the terrain is pretty unsuited for golf (steep slopes and clay soil).

Medoc Chateau - Coore. Good course, but less exciting than I had imagined. However loved the green designs. Club were making a lot of new longer backtees, I guess for the next big French pro tournament.

Medoc Vignes - Whitman. More compact than Chateau, but liked it as much. Also great green designs.

Moliets - Robert Trent Jones Sr. Nice course with some good holes in the dunes near the sea. Extremely long walking distances green-tee.

Seignosse - Robbert von Hagge. Tough very narrow course in the pine trees. (slope 145 or so ). Rather unnatural shaping.

http://www.golfarchitecturepictures.com/Pages/france.html

[BCrosby]

Coore has done a course in Bordeaux? Ca m'etonne. Je ne savais pas.

[David_Tepper]

Frank -

There was an article last month in the "How To Spend It" supplement of the Financial Times that spoke highly of the Medoc 36-hole golf complex. Did you have a chance to look around there? Did it look worthwhile as a 4 or 5 day golf vacation spot?

DT

[Philip Gawith]

David I visited Golf du Medoc two years ago and played both courses. I took photos but then delayed too long in posting them and had lost the feel for the two different courses. But bottom line is that they are two good courses and worth a visit. The Coore course certainly has some very  large greens and broad fairways, but if i recall right, the Whitman course maybe had some of the better terrain/holes.

It is pretty close to Bordeaux and a great place from which to go and visit some of the great wine chateaux. I can also recommend a great chateaux in which to stay - has about four wonderful large bedrooms.

[JohnV]

When I saw the title of this, I thought that Philadelphia was really expanding their territory.

I played a couple of courses in France in 1988 that were decent.  One was a Trent Jones course in the Alps - Chamonix Mont-Blanc and the other was in the mustard capital of France: Golf Dijon Bourgogne

Anyone else every play these.  I can't remember much about them other than Chamonix had some fantastic views of the Alps.

[Paul_Turner]

Frank

Thanks for the new pics.

Chantaco looks as badly neglected as I feared (from the few pics I'd seen previously)...that new par 3 (16th?) with the water feature looks terrible.   I've got to believe it was better years ago

[Tony Ristola]

Aren't they both really Whitman courses?

[Frank Pont]

David, the brand new hotel (which is connected to the clubhouse) is great value at 100 euro per room per night. Food is also good and the wine cheap (grand crus at 50 euros a bottle during diner).
Combine this with 36 holes a day for 90 euro and you have a pretty good weekend package (its only 20 minutes from the airport).

Paul, Chantaco was indeed a disppointment. The clubhouse is grand (the club is owned by the Lacosta family), but the course isn't recognisable as a Colt course anymore.

Tony, I believe that Whitman did the shaping and most of the on the ground work, but Jeff Mingay will know for sure.

[David_Tepper]

Frank & Philip -

Thanks for the info on Golf du Medoc. It sounds like a place worth visiting sooner rather than later.

The article on golf in France was in the May 3 issue of the Financial Times "How  To Spend It" supplement. You can find it online.

DT

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