Travel News
They met with golf
resorts, golf courses,
hotels, and regional and
state tourist offices as
well as other golf-related
supplier companies and
organisations from the
USA, Canada, Mexico,
Latin America and the
Caribbean during two
days of business sessions at the resort’s venerable Carolina
Hotel. Delegates then took part in the annual NAC golf
tournament on two of Pinehurst’s nine golf courses: the
legendary Donald Ross-designed No 2, restored by Ben
Crenshaw and Bill Coore for its third US Open in 2014 and
which will hold it again in 2024; and the Tom Fazio-designed
No 8.NAC attendees were also treated to an indoor and
outdoor Taste of North Carolina evening at the resort’s
Pinehurst Country Club with food, wine, craft beers and
spirits served up by artisans from across the state.
International golf tourism
to Spain’s Costa Brava
region is on course to
continue soaring
following the second
annual IAGTO Golf
Trophy event in Spain,
with more golfers heading
there from an
increasingly-diverse spread of countries. Girona was the host
destination for this year’s IAGTO Costa Brava Trophy, which
drew 80 golf tour operators from 23 countries and was
staged in a partnership between global golf tourism
organisation IAGTO, the Catalan Tourist Board, the Costa
Brava Girona Tourism Board and the Golf Association Costa
Brava. Inspection visits to region’s golf courses and meetings
with golf tourism suppliers took place throughout the week,
with the ‘Trophy’ taking place on the Stadium Course of the
2015 IAGTO Award-winning PGA Catalunya Resort.
In a year in which it
celebrates 50 years of
golf, Spain’s awardwinning Costa Brava
region today reports golf
visitors to the area have
increased to more than
103,000 over the past two
years. In figures collated by the Costa Brava Tourism Board,
they show a 67% growth in European golfers to the region
between 2013 and 2015, driven by visitors from France,
Germany, the UK and the Netherlands, with 2015 statistics
revealing these nationalities made up almost half of the golf
visitors to this north-eastern area of Spain. The data also
showed a healthy domestic market, with golf visitors from
Spain and the wider Catalonia area, comprising a combined
43% of visitors to Costa Brava in 2015.
Women who love to
golf will love the
Dominican Republic.
Whether traveling with
partner, family or
friends, the Capital of
Golf in the Caribbean is
the perfect destination
for women, with an
estimated 15 to 20 percent of all visitor rounds played by
women. All golf courses are well set up for women golfers,
with a range of forward tee positions carefully selected to
provide a challenging and enjoyable experience for women
of all handicap levels. Several golf courses also organize
ladies-only golf competitions on a regular basis
throughout the season.
This week the city is
welcoming the largestever delegation of golf
tourism professionals for
the annual Asia
convention, which is
organised by global golf
tourism industry
organisation IAGTO
(International Association of Golf Tour Operators) and which
has become a key networking event for golf travel in the
region. A record 643 delegates from 37 countries, including
well over 200 tour operator buyers from 156 companies and
265 seller delegates from 155 golf resorts, golf clubs, hotels,
inbound operators and tourist boards throughout the AsiaPacific region, are participating in the event at the Chiang
Mai International Exhibition and Convention Centre.
The first-ever simultaneous staging of European Tour and
Ladies’ European Tour events at the same venue, in Morocco,
underlines the country’s commitment to welcoming women
golfers. This weekend saw Rabat’s venerable Royal Golf
Dar Es Salam host exciting finishes to both the Hassan II
Trophy men’s event, won by Korean youngster Jeunghun Wang
from Spain’s Nacho Elvira after a second-hole play-off, and
the Lalla Meyrem Cup, in which Spanish rookie Nuria Iturrios
triumphed by six shots from overnight leader, England’s
Florentyna Parker, after a closing seven-under-par 65. In a
year when golf returns to the Olympic Games with ladies’
and men’s events being staged in Rio de Janeiro, Morocco has
shown the way by staging the two Tour events at the same
time and at the same golf club.
Volume 3 • Issue 35
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