Turkey - a solution to the credit crunch
The last thing that Talking Turkey would have meant in 1993 was talking about golf. Yes, there was much that could be said of a Eurasian country as large as France and Britain together. Maybe, too, of 623 years of an Ottoman Empire straddling the Middle East to Austria.
Lykia Links
Lykia Links
Telephone:
00 90 242 754 43 43
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18 holes, par 73, 6,924 yards
There again, of sultans, harems and domed Istanbul palaces; of a nation with more Greek or Roman temples, palaces and amphitheatres than Greece; of a 70-milllion population as genetically diverse as humanity offers.
Then, in 1994, came the launch of the National, Irishman David Feherty’s par-72 golf course in a pine and eucalyptus forest on a sandy Mediterranean coastal strip at Belek, 25 miles south-east of the regional capital of Antalya. That was the start of a golfing explosion.
It is not too strong a word. With the launch of two more prime courses last autumn – the Colin Montgomerie and the Peter Thomson – Belek now boasts 11 courses in a 10-mile stretch of golfing wonderland.
Soon a bridge will link it to another brand new course, Perry Dye’s extraordinary Lykia, as close to a true links as the Mediterranean has seen and all backed by hotel services of Palm Beach dimensions. You have to go there to take it in. Even so, a week’s visit may leave you wondering what you’ve missed.
It should be noted that, for British golfers seeking better-value alternatives to the Algarve and Andalucia, Turkey’s lira is more a companion of the pound than the Euro.
Alternative Travel and Holidays, our British-based hosts, flew us from Stansted into the sunshine of Antalya, a city of nearly two million, via Cyprus Turkish Airlines.
Our initial foray was played out at LykiaLinksGolf and awaiting us after the experience was the American course designer, Perry Dye, scion of the great Pete Dye family, designers of Harbour Town and Kiawah Island Ocean. Dye held court after observing our efforts following a recent heart operation.
“It’s really 72 holes,” said Dye, a large, ebullient man, blue eyes twinkling, enjoying a bit of a fight, which is as well.
“I’ve had to re-make that course three times. One, I don’t speak Turkish. It was at least four holes before I got through to guys who didn’t know a birdie from an ice cube exactly what I wanted. Two, the villagers wouldn’t let me use a multi-blade earthmover. It was single-blade or nothing, and most of those dunes, I can tell you, are the result.”
Three? “January of last year – the mother of all storms, more a tornado. It took part of the roof off the golf hotel, filled some of the villas with sand and put a metre of the stuff all over the course. That set our opening back six months to here and now.”
So, it can rain. But what do you get for your lira? Not Turnberry Ailsa or Ballybunion. That would be asking too much at such an early point. All the same, a 7,491-yard monster tamed just a little by five tee placements per hole, wonderful, expansive fairways and vistas for everyone.
To one side there’s the Med, a constant companion. To the other, the Taurus mountains, bleak and vaguely sinister.
There is tall, whiskery grass and wild flower lining dunes and fairways; pot bunkers well worthy of the name; others buttressed by a Brancaster class of sleeper; un-British zones of waste, which call for well-hit medium irons or rescue clubs; Paspallum greens presently needing a good, firm rap, the breaks, as with the fairways, mostly to the ocean; a freshwater lake, un-British again, in play at holes seven and eight; springy fairways demanding wisdom of club choice and precision. Not a bad mix.
Next door is a vast world of Lykia main hotel and villa, pools, spa facility, sea and sand frontage, kids’ club and so on.
The approach at the moment is more track than road, but all that changes soon with a metalled surface bringing the Antalya, Belek and Side townships within easy range. A par-27 nine-hole course opens this year, just another part of Lykia World’s stay-and-play service.
That’s the Turkish Riviera for you: new, some brand-new, five-star resorts at three- to four-star prices, most of the entertainment and food inclusive (Alternative’s brochure will offer golfers half-board), children well cared for, pools, tennis courts, spa treatments as much par for the course as golf.
Germans, Dutch and Scandinavians generally share it with the British – well, they all speak English don’t they? Turks swarm in for national holidays, so probably best avoided.
