Golf in Tanzania

What golf in Tanzania is actually like

Tanzania is not a golf destination in the way that South Africa or Kenya are, and anyone arriving expecting a circuit of resort courses will be disappointed. What it has instead is a small number of genuinely interesting courses in places nobody builds golf courses any more: on a plain between two of the highest mountains in Africa, inside a sugar estate, on a colonial-era club ground in the middle of a port city, and on a coral coast.

The realistic use of golf here is as a day inside a bigger trip. Travellers who play tend to arrive in the northern circuit with a day either side of a safari, or sit on the coast at the end of one, and want a round rather than a golfing holiday. Treated that way, it works well. Treated as the reason for the trip, it will feel thin. Where a spare day fits, and which legs of an itinerary have one to give, is the subject of how many days a Tanzanian trip actually needs.

One thing worth setting out at the start: information about Tanzanian golf is unusually unreliable online. Directory sites list courses in a dozen regional towns, recycling each other, and it is genuinely difficult to establish which of those are still in play. The courses named below are ones whose existence could be confirmed. Others are advertised, and may well be open, but should be confirmed directly with the club before anyone plans a journey around them.

The courses under Kilimanjaro and Meru

The most substantial golf in the country sits on the plain between Kilimanjaro and Mount Meru, at the Kilimanjaro Golf and Wildlife Estate, usually shortened to Kiligolf. It is an 1,040 acre estate roughly twenty five kilometres from both Arusha and Kilimanjaro International Airport, which puts it within easy reach of almost every northern circuit itinerary and of the airport most people fly into.

The course is eighteen holes, laid out by the designer David Jones, and the estate describes it as the first eighteen hole championship course in Tanzania. The setting is the selling point: open bush with the Maasai Steppe running away to the south, the Pare and Usambara ranges on the horizon, and Kilimanjaro and Meru on either side when the cloud lifts, which on most days means early morning. There is accommodation on the estate and a residential development around it, so it functions as somewhere to stay as well as somewhere to play.

Because it is a wildlife estate as well as a golf estate, the usual caveats about playing in open country apply. Ask at the clubhouse what moves across the course and what the local rules say about it.

Moshi

Moshi, the town under Kilimanjaro that most climbs start from, has two courses. The Moshi Golf Course is run by the Moshi Gymkhana Club, one of the old up-country clubs of the kind that exist across East Africa. The second is the TPC Moshi Golf Course, operated by the TPC Club and sitting within the sugar estate south of town.

Moshi's altitude runs between roughly 700 and 950 metres, which is enough to take some of the edge off the heat without materially changing how far the ball goes. The town is markedly cooler than the surrounding lowlands, and for most of the year it is comfortable enough to play through the middle of the day, which is not true everywhere in the country.

For anyone building a trip around climbing Kilimanjaro, a round in Moshi is a reasonable way to spend an acclimatisation day or one of the flat days afterwards, though a golf swing on legs that have just come down from Uhuru is its own kind of challenge.

Dar es Salaam

The Gymkhana golf course sits northwest of Kivukoni, close to the waterfront and the city centre, and is the most central golf in the country. It is a club ground in the full sense, with tennis courts, squash courts and a fitness club alongside the golf, and it has the particular character of a course that the city has grown around rather than one laid out in open country.

The other course in the city is the Lugalo Military Golf Course, inside the Lugalo Military Barracks. Access to a course on a military site is not the same as access to a public one, so anyone intending to play there should establish the position in advance rather than turning up.

Dar es Salaam is hot and humid at sea level all year. Early tee times are not a preference here, they are the whole plan.

Zanzibar

Golf on Unguja is limited but it does exist. The Sea Cliff Resort and Spa at Kama Village near Mangapwani, on the island's west coast north of Stone Town, has a golf course alongside a mini golf course. The resort's own published material confirms the golf but does not set out the hole count, the par, the length or the designer, so it is worth asking those questions before assuming what kind of round it is.

Most people on Unguja are there for the coast rather than for golf, and the island's real draws sit elsewhere: Stone Town and Swahili culture, the reef, and the beaches. Golf here is an afternoon, not an itinerary.

Course condition, and the questions worth asking first

Condition varies a great deal between Tanzanian courses and between seasons on the same course, and it is the single thing most likely to surprise a visitor who has only played manicured resort golf. The long rains, which fall heavily from around March to May in the north, change what a course plays like considerably. The courses on the coast and in the south are not all on the same calendar, which is set out in Tanzania's two rainfall regimes.

Rather than guess, ask the club directly before travelling:

• What the putting surfaces actually are. Some East African courses use sand or oil dressed surfaces rather than grass greens, which changes the game entirely, and it is far better to know in advance than to find out on the first hole.
• Whether the course is open to visitors and green fee players, or members and their guests only. Club courses and the military course are not all equally open.
• Whether there is a dress code, which at the older club courses there usually is.
• What the course is like in the current season, and whether any holes are out of play.
• Whether they have a handicap requirement or want to see a handicap certificate.

Clubs, caddies and what to bring

Club hire exists at the larger courses but the range and condition of hire sets cannot be assumed, particularly for left handed players and for anyone who needs anything other than a standard men's set. Travellers who play seriously generally bring their own clubs. Airlines flying into Kilimanjaro International and Dar es Salaam carry golf bags as sports equipment, and it is worth confirming the allowance rather than discovering it at check in.

Caddies are part of the culture at the club courses, and taking one is normal rather than optional. A caddie who knows the course is worth far more here than at a course you could read yourself, because local knowledge covers things no yardage book does. Bring balls. Bring more balls than you think, because resupply is not reliable and open bush courses eat them.

Practical kit for playing near the equator at altitude: high factor sun protection, a hat with a brim, far more water than a round at home requires, and insect repellent for early and late tee times.

Fitting a round around a safari

The geography makes this straightforward in the north and awkward everywhere else. Kiligolf and the Moshi courses sit on the road that almost every northern itinerary already uses, between the airport, Arusha and the parks, so a round slots in without adding a travel day. A common shape is to play on arrival, while adjusting to the time difference, and then drive west into the parks.

On the coast, a day at the Zanzibar course fits into a beach stay at the end of a trip. Dar es Salaam golf makes sense mainly for people who are in the city anyway, on business or between flights, rather than as a detour.

What does not work well is trying to string the courses together into a golfing tour. The distances are long, the roads are slow, and the courses are not close enough to each other to make a circuit worth the driving. Golf here is best as a good day inside a trip that is about something else.

Questions travellers ask