Short Notice, june 22, 2012

The Chinese financiers who pull the strings at the Baha Mar mega-resort in the Bahamas will break ground on their Jack Nicklaus “signature” golf course next month. The track will take shape on property that was once home of Cable Bay Golf Club, which opened in the late 1920s (it was designed by Devereaux Emmet) and was the Bahamas’ first golf course. Baha Mar is a 1,000-acre spread along Nassau’s Cable Beach that will eventually have hundreds of villas and condos, the biggest casino in the Caribbean, the biggest convention center in the Bahamas, a shopping area, and at least six hotels. The course is expected to open in late 2013.

Some information in the previous post originally appeared in the May 2010 and April 2012 issues of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

David Murdock has agreed to sell his 98 percent share of Lanai, one of the Hawaiian islands, to Oracle’s CEO, Larry Ellison. Murdock, the billionaire who owns Dole Food Company, bought Lanai in 1985 and built two golf courses on it, the Challenge at Manele (Jack Nicklaus, designer) and the Experience at Koele (Greg Norman). He also owns Sherwood Country Club in Thousand Oaks, California and, via Castle & Cooke, golf properties in Arizona, North Carolina, and California. He’s 89, and I’m wondering if the sale of Lanai means that his other golf properties are also on the market.

Government officials in Andalucia, Spain have nixed proposals to build nine golf courses. The problem, according to the territory’s tourism minister, is that the developers were trying to “circumvent the planning regulations” by building “predominately residential projects.” The snubbed projects are in Almogia, Lucena, Almería, Casarabonela, Granada, and Barbate.

Later this year, the number-one Toyota dealer in Nigeria expects to officially open an 18-hole, “championship-standard” golf course in suburban Akure, the capital of the state of Ondo. The track will have a Florida flavor, as it’s been designed by Lakeland-based Ron Garl and built by Vero Beach-based Total Golf Construction. You can find it at Michael Ade Ojo’s Elizade Golf Resort, which will eventually sprout a 200-room hotel, a water park, and some condos. The course has already drawn comparisons to IBB International Golf & Country Club in Abuja and Le Meridien Ibom Golf Course in Uyo, which a Nigerian newspaper says are “the only Nigerian courses with world-class attributes.”

Some information in the preceding post originally appeared in the July 2010 issue of the World Edition of the Golf Course Report.

A partially completed, Gary Player-designed golf course in Thailand’s Chonburi Province is for sale. Sri Racha International Golf Course, part of a resort located roughly 60 miles southeast of Bangkok, opened in 1992 and has 12 completed holes. I can’t tell you why the course wasn’t finished, but I can report that an Asian travel site calls it “a relatively easy course best suited for less-experienced players.”