Hayling Island Golf Club

Hayling Island is situated about a 1.5 hour drive from London on Hayling Island itself which is a small bit of land near Portsmouth that is cut off during high tide. The course is a hidden gem, and a cracker, we played it several times on our visit to the Portsmouth area, and would highly recommend playing here. It's opens a little soft with a short par 3, but then gets going with a couple of strong holes, an excellent dogleg par 5 2nd, and a series of testing long par 4s. The other outstanding holes are the short par 3-5th called the Narrows because of the shape of the green, the 11th a sort of clifftop par 3 green. The greens were on the small side, and are very fast. Its quite good, but has its shortfalls, conditions are not the best at times, it's definitely not a highly manicured course, there are some fine holes round the turn. It's a beautiful setting for a golf course with beautiful views across the Solent to the Isle of Wright. It's an old historic course, first opening in the 1880's, with design work over the years by J.H. Taylor in the early 1900's, and then Tom Simpson in the 1930s. Classic links layout, reasonably priced, and a fine and unique test.