In Summary
- The combination of great weather, affordable green fees, ample and also affordable hotel rooms, frequent flights from Nairobi into Mombasa and Ukunda are all the necessary ingredients for a booming golf tourism industry.
The Kenyan coast is home to some of Kenya’s top
championship golf courses; the Leisure Golf Club in Diani, Kwale, the
Nyali Golf and Country Club just off the island on the North Coast and
the Baobab Course at the Vipingo Ridge further North towards Kilifi.
These three golf courses, all of them 18-hole challenging
layouts, are playable through the year and are reasonably priced. In
terms of accommodation, leisure is part of the Leisure Beach Resort
which offers more than 200 hotel rooms and there are several other
hotels in close proximity, including Leopard Beach, Diani Reef and
Swahili Beach Resort.
Frequent flights
In Nyali, the course is within a few club lengths
from the belt of hotels, just off Link Road – Voyager Beach Resort, Reef
Hotel, Nyali Beach and Bahari Beach Hotel. Vipingo Ridge boasts its own
accommodation, a combination of villa rooms and private homes; the
hotels on Shanzu Beach – Serena, Continental and Flamingo are all within
a 25 minute drive of Vipingo Ridge.
Why then isn’t golf tourism a big deal at the Kenyan coast?
The combination of great weather, affordable green
fees, ample and also affordable hotel rooms, frequent flights from
Nairobi into Mombasa and Ukunda are all the necessary ingredients for a
booming golf tourism industry.
Some may want to cite insecurity as an issue and
they would not be far off the truth if that was in reference to foreign
tourists sitting in Oslo reading the Lonely Planet Guide.
But for a local tourist in Kisumu, Nyeri or
Nairobi, the streets of downtown Nairobi are definitely more unsafe than
the tranquil fairways at Vipingo or Leisure Lodge. So, why is golf
tourism, especially local golf tourism, not booming?
In a bid to address this problem, the Kenya Tourism
Board has sponsored a local golf series that aims to spur golf tourism.
Speaking at the launch of the series, KTB managing director, Muriithi
Ndegwa, said the events will be held across the country.
“At KTB, our core mandate is to drive marketing of
tourism locally, regionally and internationally. To promote local
tourism, we are working with the county governments to promote Kenya as
the preferred tourism destination for both local and international
visitors,” he said.
Common front
“We must create synergies between tourism marketing
by the counties and the national mandate entrusted to KTB and forge a
common front in marketing the diversity of the tourism products that
Kenya is endowed with.
“The KTB golf events in Nyali, Nakuru, Nyanza, Vet
Lab, Sigona, Limuru and Eldoret are part of this strategy to spur local
tourism in the various counties.”
This weekend, the KTB Golf Series will visit the
18-hole championship golf course at the Nyali Golf and Country Club
where 200 plus golfers from across the country are expected to
participate.
“We have been to Nyali before and we are encouraged
by the efforts the Country Club and the hotels at the North Coast have
put in place to promote local golf tourism,” Ndegwa added.
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