This is not a dream. There really is an 18-hole David McLay Kidd golf course on your private island in the middle of the South Pacific. Verdant, narrow fairways laced between hills landscaped with lush palms; a signature par-5 extending right onto a white-sand beach; and, quite likely, not another golfer in sight. Of course, you didn’t come all the way to Fiji just to play golf. Even without its McLay Kidd course, Como Laucala is one of Earth’s most remarkable destinations, with just 25 villa-style accommodations scattered throughout the more than 3,000-acre island. The undeveloped expanse offers ample opportunities for hiking and horseback riding, while underwater explorers enjoy access to some of the world’s best dive sites. comohotels.com
Jamaica isn’t the first Caribbean island most people think of for golf. But “the Rock,” as Jamaicans call it, is home to a handful of exceptional courses, including Half Moon Golf Course, a classic Robert Trent Jones Sr. design that serves as a cornerstone attraction at Half Moon resort. The course meanders through a former sugarcane estate, hugging the base of the hills that overlook the property’s namesake Half Moon Bay. Modernized by Roger Rulewich in 2005, the 7,120-yard layout still showcases Trent Jones’s shallow fairway bunkers and notably contoured greens. In addition to golf, the resort, which is celebrating its 70th anniversary this year, features an oceanside spa with overwater bungalows, a 28-horse equestrian center, and two miles of white-sand beach. halfmoon.com
Baha Mar is big: Three hotels, a 100,000-square-foot casino, more than 40 restaurants, a 15-acre waterpark, and multiple boutiques, sports facilities, and just about everything else you can imagine a resort having. There is something for literally everyone at this development on Nassau’s Cable Beach, and that’s good news for golfers, who can enjoy the resort’s Royal Blue course without worrying about whether non-golfing family members are having fun. The Jack Nicklaus signature design is set just inland from the hotels, playing through a varied landscape of dunes and limestone-lined lagoons. After your round, retire to the development’s best hotel, Rosewood Baha Mar, where amenities include a Daniel Boulud restaurant and a private beach club. rosewoodhotels.com, bahamar.com
Old Hawaii is alive and well on Lāna‘i, a mostly private island that’s home to historic Lāna‘i City, empty beaches, abundant marine life, and two completely different Four Seasons resorts. Sensei Lāna‘i is a wellness retreat set in the pine-covered mountains of the island’s interior. Four Seasons Resort Lāna‘i, meanwhile, sits majestically above Hulopo‘e Bay, the lone beach resort on one of Hawaii’s most alluring islands. Here, too, is the rightfully renowned Manele Golf Course, a Jack Nicklaus signature design that hugs the lava outcroppings and cliffs above the bay. (The course is open to guests of both resorts.) Chances are, you’ll lose a golf ball or two—several tees require forced carries—but you’ll likely see dolphins while playing one of the most enjoyable rounds of your life. fourseasons.com
“God spent overtime when he created this place,” golfing great Bernhard Langer once said of the famed Hualālai resort along Hawaii’s Kona-Kohala coast. The development’s Jack Nicklaus signature course hosts the annual Mitsubishi Electric Championship, an event that attracts the top players on the Champions Tour, often accompanied by their extended families and friends. The resort’s many allures include King’s Pond, a swimmable lava-rock aquarium containing nearly 2 million gallons of saltwater. When it comes to golf, the Big Island’s black lava fields provide a spectacular backdrop (and powerful ball magnet) on the Nicklaus course, which finishes along the Pacific. To hone your skills in style, head to the Hualālai Golf Hale, the resort’s 3,000-square-foot indoor/outdoor instruction facility. fourseasons.com
The finest beach in Anguilla is the sweeping Rendezvous Bay, with its broad expanse of white sand sloping gently into the warm, calm, blue sea. The southerly prospect reaches across the Anguilla Channel, to the island of Saint-Martin in the distance. Above Rendezvous Bay—in pride of place on this quiet and unspoiled Caribbean island—is Aurora Anguilla, which is home to the destination’s only golf courses. The first is a stunning, inviting championship test created by Greg Norman, which is perfectly complemented by a nine-hole short course. While Norman’s design is defined by a series of water features and expansive bunkers, it also offers plenty of pristine fairway for golfers to find. The short course is ideal for a quick game or a little practice, and it is certain to get the less-experienced player hooked. auroraanguilla.com
Barbados’s prestige as a golf destination recently got a boost with the construction of a Ron Kirby–designed course that trundles through tropical forest about 1,000 feet above sea level. The 6,972-yard Apes Hill golf course—the crown jewel of a resort and residential community of the same name—delivers striking vistas (much like Kirby’s most famous design, Old Head Golf Links, does in Ireland). In fact, along certain stretches of the course, golfers enjoy simultaneous views of the Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean Sea. The Apes Hill resort is still in development, but guests can enjoy amenities that include hiking and nature trails, racket courts, swimming pools, a fitness club, and a destination spa, while staying in plush three- or four-bedroom villas. apeshill.com
Heritage Golf Club, hugging the southern shoreline of Mauritius, is the Indian Ocean’s only 45-hole golf resort. Impressively, Heritage has developed a pair of championship golf courses that are contrasting in nature: the linksy La Reserve Golf Links, co-designed by past Open champ Louis Oosthuizen, and the lush, parkland setup of Le Chateau. Heritage also offers a pair of luxury beach resorts, Le Telfair and Awali. For an ultra-exclusive journey into 19th-century French elegance, guests can stay in the private suite of Le Chateau, overlooking ornamental gardens and its namesake golf course. heritagegolfclub.mu
This Maldives retreat might be the archetypal private island resort. A 45-minute seaplane flight from Malé’s Velana Airport, or a 35-minute speedboat ride from the Maafaru private airstrip, Velaa is one, very small yet perfectly formed island among a constellation that makes up the Noonu Atoll. The island offers 47 villas and residences, 18 of which sit above the turquoise ocean shallows. Behind the white-sand island fringe and palm trees, the theme of “small yet perfectly formed” extends to the seven-hole Velaa Golf Academy course, designed by Masters legend Jose Maria Olazábal. Seven holes are plenty on an island that reaches only 500 yards each way, especially with nine sets of tees and tour-level greens and bunkering. Velaa also offers a range of golf training facilities and programs with PGA professionals. velaaprivateisland.com
For the better part of half a century, Casa de Campo’s flagship golf course, Teeth of the Dog, has been hailed as the Caribbean’s premier design. Beginning in January, the Pete Dye masterpiece will close for a projected 10-month restoration, one that will see the entire course re-grassed with Dynasty Paspalum, a varietal that’s ideal for seaside conditions. Along the way, the project’s lead architect, Jerry Pate, will not only expand and reshape greenside bunkers, but return the greens to their original size, slightly re-contouring them in the process. When the course reopens next November, it will join Casa de Campo’s new Premier Club (a standalone wing of butler-enhanced luxury suites) and state-of-the-art destination spa in a trio of amenities that promise to reestablish this historic retreat in the Dominican Republic as the Caribbean’s leading golf resort. casadecampo.com.do
Arnold Palmer and George Fazio designed the championship golf courses at Turtle Bay, a family friendly luxury resort along Oahu’s famed North Shore. It is a spectacular Pacific landscape that has been sensitively developed, with protection of the natural environment being paramount. The property extends to 1,300 acres, half of which is conservation space. Playing golf at Turtle Bay is to connect with nature, as the courses meander through Oahu’s wetlands and circumvent natural waterways, marshland, dense Hawaiian jungle, and bird sanctuaries. The resort features its own 468-acre Kuilima Farm, the produce from which heads straight to the kitchens and spa, as well as supplying surrounding communities. turtlebayresort.com
Laurance Rockefeller first developed Dorado Beach nearly 70 years ago, and the coastal resort community remains one of Puerto Rico’s preeminent destinations. The 2012 opening of the Ritz-Carlton Reserve—extending across 50 acres within the Rockefeller estate—took Dorado Beach to a new level. Elegant villas and suites, multiple pools, a pristine beach, and a sprawling destination spa make for one of the Caribbean’s most luxurious resorts. As for golf, the TPC-branded club features two championship-caliber courses, and a third layout, designed by Robert Trent Jones Jr., is set to open later this year. The forthcoming West Course, with a projected cost of almost $20 million, is the latest chapter in a long family history at the resort, where Robert Trent Jones Sr. built the original East Course in 1958. ritzcarlton.com
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