Located at the northern tip of the Gulf of Aqaba, on Egypt’s Sinai peninsula, Taba Heights is the area’s newest and most prestigious championship golf course. With the dramatic Sinai Mountains providing its backdrop, the course will overlook the azure waters of the Red Sea, offering views of Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Israel.
Designed by John Sanford, a member of the American Society of Golf Course Architects, the new 18-hole championship golf course will measure 7,100 yards (6,450m) and is designed to suit and challenge golfers of all levels. As part of this philosophy, each hole will offer the option of five different tee placements, allowing golfers to either undergo exciting challenges or stick within their handicap levels.
Golfers can expect many target fairways and approach shots over lakes, flood canals or well surrounded desert green complexes. The course offers elevation ranging from 4m to 70m. Such landscape is what makes the course so striking and beautiful; and what made the course’s management make it mandatory for all golfers to use golf carts at all times.
To cope with the arid climate four large lakes and three flood diversion canals channel the water coming from the mountains to the sea during the rainy/flood periods, protect the course and surrounding area. In addition, the course uses a special grass type which can withstand brackish water up to 8,000ppm in concentration.
Such grass requires less water, reduced fertilisation and pesticide applications, yet still offers a great surface for golf playability. Additionally, the irrigation system is computerised using a sophisticated weather station which calculates the right amount of water using evapotranspiration data from the surrounding atmosphere. A variable frequency drive state of the art pumping system is also in use.
Taba Heights is owned by Orascom Hotels & Development. The Orascom Group is one of the largest and most successful conglomerates in Egypt with more than 20,000 employees in five major companies leading in areas of tourism, development, construction and telecommunications.
As a destination Taba Heights provides guaranteed year round sunshine, offering a great environment for golf and ensuring that the course is available to guests all year round. For those who just wish to incorporate golf as part of their holiday rather than making it a focus, however, the resort also offers a range of other activities. Sports such as diving, snorkelling, wakeboarding, sailing, parasailing and quad biking through the desert are available; while so too are cultural excursions to nearby sites in Petra and Jerusalem. The resort also offers a total of five hotels to choose from, many of which participate in the special dine around program, meaning that guests, on a half-board and full-board basis, can make the most of the 32 bars and restaurants located in the resort, regardless of which hotel they are staying at.
Taba Heights www.tabaheights.com
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