Belle Dune

Golf de Belle Dune is the southernmost club in the triumvirate also comprised of Le Touquet and Hardelot. Belle Dune is set on the Channel Coast in an area known as Côte d’Opale close to Baie d’Autie in the Somme area.

It’s a young course that opened for play in 1992 and Jean-Manuel Rossi designed it. Belle Dune nestles perfectly within some of the finest dune land in Europe, a stone’s throw away from the sea. It is a fair and accessible course, which measures 5,883 metres from the back tees and slope index set at 140.

The first few holes wind through green maritime pine trees and tend to give confidence to the players. The next series of holes wander through poplars and silver birch bent by the breeze where a sideways glance reveals hedgerows of buckthorn, sparkling with orange berries. At the turn the vista changes to immense golden sand dunes covered with marram grasses.

The Marquenterre reserve, in which the course lies, is not only botanic paradise, it’s also home to the diverse wildlife of migrating birds, ducks, pheasants and rabbits. Belle Dune is not overly long for the handicap player, but it will nonetheless test every aspect of your game. Fairways must be found all costs and the greens are always very quick and difficult to read. With the SSS set at 74 from the back tees, Belle Dune is no pushover.

The following edited extract is from France’s Most Beautiful Courses by Jean-François Lefevre:

“Belle Dune was hailed as one of the most beautiful French courses constructed in the 1990s. Built by the Syndicat de la Côte Picarde, the Belle Dune course at Fort-Mahon-Plage exemplifies a successful union of golf and ecology. It took more than two years to find solutions to the problems posed by building this course on the largest area of sand dunes in Europe.

In contrast to other links which may appear uninteresting, Belle Dune beckons on a three-part stroll. The first between holes 1 to 11, crosses a forest of pine and birch trees. The second, from the 12th to the 14th, enters the sand dunes. There is a vivid contrast between the verdant greens and the yellowish beach grass plants which surround them. Along the final holes, from 15 to 18, the pine trees return to border the fairways and run up to the clubhouse.”