Pueblo de Oro

The city of Cagayan de Oro is the capital of Misamis Oriental province on Mindaneo, the southernmost major island in the Philippines, with a population in excess of half a million people. One of the fastest growing cities in the country, its residents enjoy all the benefits of living in a modern urban area without the traffic jam and flooding negatives that blight Metro Manila.

Pueblo de Oro Development Corporation established the 360-hectare Pueblo de Oro Township in the mid-1990s with a championship standard golf course as its main sporting amenity. One of more than half a dozen courses designed by Robert Trent Jones Jnr in the Philippines, the 18-hole layout was formally opened on 5 May 1998 by then President Fidel V. Ramos.

The fairways are routed around five lakes on a property that’s characterised by broad ridges and deep ravines, and the course is configured in two distinct returning loops of nine holes.

The par threes are of particular note here and the first of these arrives early in the round at the 199-yard 2nd, followed by the downhill 6th, which plays across an intimidating gully.

On the back nine, the two-tiered green at the 177-yard 11th sits behind water whilst the tee shot on the signature hole 13th must carry another gorge on its way to a wide, shallow putting surface.