Vipingo golf estate scores a first in Africa

Kilifi County is home to one of the most prestigious golf courses in Kenya. Yet, in its brief existence, the 18-hole Baobab Golf Course at Vipingo Ridge has attained what no other courses in Africa has. In October, the golf course attained the Professional Golfers Association (PGA) status. It is a first for Africa. A PGA status means that Vipingo is now on the world’s top golfers’ radar.

But Vipingo is a paradox of sorts. Recently, I perused a coffee table book on African golf courses in South Africa, another country famed for its serene courses. Nowhere did Vipingo Ridge feature. Whether it was by default or design, I can’t tell. But it was not fair, or so I thought.

I have tried my hand in golf on a number of courses in Kenya. As any golfer will tell you, each course has its challenges. Some are windy. Others have water hazards than can test every fibre in a golfer’s body. Others are just there.

Located at the hot and humid north Coast, Vipingo may attract the typical nuances of an unbearable course. To any observer, its location on top of a hill makes it a direct recipient of the heat waves of the equatorial sun. Yet, the cool breeze coming out of the ocean and gently lapping the hillside dispels such notions.

MULTI-MILLION HOMES

But Vipingo’s repute as an international golfing destination would not be complete without mentioning the multi-million-shilling homes woven around the course.

Having to swing and tee off towards any of the mansions must be a nerve-wrecking experience for any player, pro and amateur alike.

Yet, a golf course of international repute is as good as its designer. For Vipingo Ridge, this is David Jones, a man who has had previous experience designing other world-class courses, including the Antalya Golf Course in Turkey, another PGA flagship project. Prior to this, Jones launched his career by designing the picturesque Killarney Golf Club in Ireland. He terms it as one of the toughest courses in Europe. He should know this, himself being an accomplished player.

In Kenya, Jones is also behind the design of Aberdare Hills Golf Resort near Naivasha. With its ancient trees and shrubs, tall cliffs and deep river ravines, Jones described the scene then as taken straight out of the plateaus of Jurassic Park “except instead of dinosaurs we had buffalo”.

For Vipingo, Jones had his ingredients laid out – a nearby freshwater lake and 2,500 acres of Africa from which to carve out a modern golf course.

“I decided to pump [the water] two kilometres along, and 140 metres up, to the highest part of the site, build the clubhouse there in a big pool, and let the water gravity-feed down from the first waterfall through a couple of thousand metres of streams, cascades and ponds,” he writes on his personal profile page. “What a build experience, two machines and hundreds of workers doing almost everything by hand.”

This is a humble acknowledgment of talents from a man, who in 1966, had to forgo the study of architecture at the university so that he could play golf!

RALLY DRIVER

But Vipingo was almost an accident. Alastair Cavenagh, Vipingo Ridge chairman and founder member, is known in local circles as an avid rally driver and oil marketer than a real estate investor. Still, this did not deter him and his business associates from trying their hand in construction.

“We were looking for a small golf course near the beach,” he told me in a past interview. But the piece of land they got was inadequate. They got wind of a nearby 2,500 acres that they turned into one of the most prestigious addresses in Kenya. Vipingo Ridge was born.

Like the desert rose, Vipingo Ridge thrives and stands out of the almost barren land punctuated by an old sisal estate. It is hard to imagine that this gem that lies in the middle of rural Africa will play host to the Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroys of this world in coming days.

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