Ribagolfe (1) - Lisbon & Centre - Portugal
Vargem Fresca,
EN 119,
Infantando,
2135-194 Samora Correia,
Portugal
+351 (0) 263 930 040
60km E of Lisbon
Welcome - contact in advance
Jose Maria Cazal Ribeiro
Peter Townsend - European Golf Design
Alfredo Castilho da Cunha
Visit Golfbreaks.com for a golf holiday at Ribagolfe (1)
Measuring 7,370 yards from the tips, the Ribagolfe No.1 course was designed by Peter Townsend of European Golf Design with tournament play in mind. But Ribagolfe No.1, sometimes referred to as the Blue course, is very playable for club golfers from the forward tees. One of two 18-hole courses that are laid out within a huge cork oak forest to the north east of Lisbon, the No.1 course plays longer and tighter than the No.2 course, with narrower fairways placing a premier on accurate shot making. Treacherous lakes come into play on the back nine at the long par five 12th, the short par four 14th and at the shortest hole on the course, the all-carry par three 15th, where water sits to the front left of a raised green that’s flanked on either side by sand. |
Reviews for Ribagolfe (1)
The 36-hole Ribagolfe facility is located an hour’s drive from Lisbon, with both 18-hole courses laid out across one third of a large estate that’s mainly covered in carob oak trees. It’s said that a clubhouse cannot be built next to the opening and closing holes because the layouts occupy part of a national park but such planning issues should surely have been 
resolved before building the courses? As it stands, there’s a clubhouse of sorts located close to the entrance gates, a 5-minute drive away, which is slightly inconvenient but of no great consequence in the wider scheme of things.
The course itself is all you would expect of a European Golf Design project – a top class layout with wide, beautifully routed fairways which have obviously been constructed to a very high standard. Quite a number of greens are perched on natural ridges and high spots, with really good use made of the rolling topography. The only real blemish for me was the par five 12th, rated stroke index 1, where the fairway kinks severely left, over an enormous beach bunker, to a stone-edged green that sits 
next to an artificial lake.
The beach bunker theme returns again at the par three 15th before the run for home begins in earnest at the following hole, a left doglegged par five that’s played to a green with an enormous tree and huge bunker complex for protection directly in front of the putting surface. Ribagolfe I is a really decent track with a particularly good set of par threes (especially the 196-yard 5th, where the tee shot from an elevated position must carry to a green that’s benched into the upslope on the opposite side of a little valley) and it’s worth going the extra kilometres from the city to play.
Jim McCann
