When Kirsty Coventry completed her four-medal haul for Zimbabwe in Beijing last year (four medals more than South Africa won in the pool, as I never tire of reminding Ryk and Roland), it inspired a sudden and wildly inaccurate belief around the world that all Zimbabweans are natural swimmers. This is complete fallacy: other than training for a midnight dash across the Limpopo to evade South African immigration officials, Zimbabweans generally avoid water, a national trait I’ve been reminded of this week.

I’m in the Algarve on an important quest to avail myself of the golf, beer and sun-kissed lifestyle, and see how the Garden Route shapes up by way of comparison; of the eight bikini-clad delights littering the pool deck of our villa, two hail from Bulawayo. This has led to an rather unusual situation: my mate Bruce’s two-year-old daughter, at an age where she’d be the one being monitored, is instead on regular lifeguard duty, in case my two fellow Zimbabweans tumble into the water and need rescuing.

No drama so far, thankfully; it’s been life most pleasant in a corner of the world that works as a giant golfing Garden Route. Portugal’s southern coast is packed with resort and championship courses, and you could spend months here contentedly losing balls on new fairways every day. One week makes for a solid introduction, though, and the two courses played so far make for interesting observations in the context of golf back home.

The layout at San Lorenzo, like many in the Algarve, is short, tight, and rewarding of the accurate player who lays ego aside and leaves driver in the bag. Winding through a golf estate, it isn’t as high density as a Steenberg or a Dainfern, but the houses, tapping into apricot and peach colour schemes (real houses can only be painted in what most of us know as fruit, apparently), are large, swaggering affairs, and all suggest the inhabitants are European Shaiks and Madoffs.

Rising and falling through coastal Portuguese parkland, San Lorenzo is lush, green, and thoroughly enjoyable, albeit punitive, particularly as buying golf balls in European pro shops is considerably more expensive than the traditional South African method of haggling with a guy at the side of the course for a pile of reclaimed ProV1s. Good start to the tour though; Tuesday continued in the same vein with the Royal Course at Vale do Lobo, and one of the most visually arresting holes on the continent.

Reminiscent of the ninth at Pinnacle Point, or the 14th at Pezula, the 16th at the Royal Course is a breathtaking hole; it’s also slightly terrifying when you’re playing off the back tees, and have 200-odd metres to clear before landing on a green that looks an unlikely target. Hitting the green is thus a very satisfying achievement; just standing on the teebox, though, is enough to make the round worthwhile.

The Royal is joined by the Ocean Course to make up 36 holes at one of the region’s top resorts, and a couple of European Tour events have made their way to Vale do Lobo; the calibre of course explains why, although the Royal Course is on the short side, again a good day for the three-wood off the tee. Water features (with a healthy appetite for golf balls) stud a beautiful stretch of golfing country, and halfway house has Super Bock on tap, so all told a standout day on the course.

Quinta do Lago’s South Course on Thursday will complete the week’s golf, before a mad dash to Edinburgh on Friday to catch the weekend action at the Dunhill Links Championship at St. Andrews; and I’ve no doubt another superb Algarve course awaits. But in simple golf terms, playing here has reinforced a simple truth — that South African courses are outstanding, and can comfortably compete with anywhere else in the world.

And so, while a golf holiday here is obviously a delight, spending a week traversing Pinnacle Point and Oubaai, Fancourt and Kingswood, Pezula and Simola, is as good a golfing escape as any. The difference this week, of course, is a luxury villa, assorted Greek, South African and Zimbabwean models beside a heated pool, and views out over the ocean from behind the safety of another cold beer. But the novelty is a considerable factor: as a holidaying European, sit in the clubhouse at Pinnacle after 18 holes for the first time, or gaze out from a coastal villa at Oubaai, and you’ll be every bit as mesmerised.

  • Contact Dan at dan@metropolis.co.za


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