Parkview

The course at Parkview Golf Club was established in 1916 when LB Waters, the new club’s Scottish professional and four-time winner of the South African Open, set out a series of golf holes along a long, narrow green belt on either side of the Braamfontein Spruit.

The original two opening and closing holes were sold to the Transvaal Exploration Company in 1930 and four new holes – today’s 12th to 15th – were introduced by a man who designed a number of South African courses at that time, Colonel S.V. Hotchkin.

The sluit, or canal, dominates the Parkview course as fairways straddle the waterway in two uneven loops of 8 then 10 holes. On almost every hole, golfers face out of bounds on one side of the fairway and water on the other.

Bobby Locke became a member of the club shortly after he won both the South African Open (the first of nine such victories) and Amateur Championship at Parkview in 1935 and the club has since erected a memorial bridge in his honour at the 13th hole.

All greens and bunkers at Parkview were renovated in a major upgrade exercise that concluded in 2002. A statue of Bobby Locke was unveiled outside the clubhouse as part of the club’s centenary celebrations in 2016.