How Far Would You Travel to Play Golf?

/ The Grateful Golfer

Living in Canada, travelling just for golf is a given. “There are an estimated 2,400 golf courses across the country, while Statistics Canada pegs the number of golfers in Canada at about 1.5 million. That’s one course for every 625 players, or 14,500 Canadians—among the highest number per capita in the world.” (Mcleans 2014) However, once you leave the Trans-Canada highway or 401 / Golden Horseshoe corridor, options for golf become less and less.

For example, within 100 km (60 miles) drive of Trenton, Ontario, (where I lived at the beginning of the 2016 golf season), there were over 80 golf courses. Now I live in North Bay, Ontario, and there are only 12 courses within the same distance. My options of quantity and quality diminished greatly, but my desire to travel for golf has not.

Glen Abbey Entrance

I traveled 2 hours one way to Play Glen Abbey Golf Course – It was definitely worth the trip!

In Canada, most avid golfers are willing to go to great lengths to play their favorite sport. We understand that getting in your vehicle with a “double double”, snacks and a map are all essential for a great road trip. The challenge that many have, is the distance they need to travel to play quality courses and in some cases any course. 

Reading quality course reviews available in Canada and the USA continues to fan the flame wanting to travel for golf. If you have not read any reviews from the following blogs, then I recommend that you do:

Golf course reviews from these and other sites help shape my future plans. Personally, I have written a few reviews over the years, but they were on courses I played from other travel, not specifically for golf. Now that I have more time on my hands, I want to expand my horizons, however I am struggling on how far I actually want to travel to play golf.

I know many of you have traveled to play golf. So I am asking for your opinion. Drop me a line so I can develop some form of reference as to the reasonable distances to travel. Here are a couple of timelines that might help shape your response:

  • One Day
  • Two Day
  • Seven Days
  • Fourteen Days

I would be grateful for any advice you could offer.

I am a grateful golfer! See you on the links!

19 thoughts on “How Far Would You Travel to Play Golf?”

  1. Awesome Jim, thanks for the mention! As you know I travel all over the place for golf. I usually do it in chunks though. If it is just a weekend thing I try to keep it to 4 hours one way. That allows me to get back at a decent hour on Sunday. Then again on vacations I have traveled as far as Bandon Dunes for golf.

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  2. Hey Jim,

    Thanks for the mention!

    1 day (assuming returning home in the same day) – I’ll drive a few hours to play a very good course.

    2 days: I’ve driven from Calgary to the Okanagan (about 6 hours) for a couple of days to play golf. It felt like a lot of driving for 2 days, but good golf is always worth it.

    7 days: A short plane ride or a longer road trip. We’ve had a week off and drove to Vancouver and back (about 10 hours each way), picking off golf courses along the way. This is also a good duration to jump on a plane for a few hours. For week long trips I’ve been on many trips to the States, mostly on the west cost, which is luckily only a few hours away on a plane!

    14 days: Now I’m into territory where I will travel almost any distance. Although I’d ideally like more time to travel overseas to golf (3 weeks would be perfect), it’s more than doable in 2 weeks. Furthest I’ve travelled for 2 weeks to golf is Hawaii (about 7 hours on the plane).

    Longer: As you may remember, Beth and I went on a 3 month road trip where we drove over 8,000km and played most of the best courses on the west coast. I highly recommend this option 🙂

    Hope this is what you were after!

    Cheers
    Josh

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  3. Hi Jim, I once traveled from N.Z. to England to play golf. Arrived Saturday morning, met the boys, played the tournament, got up Sunday morning and flew back. My golf was rubbish, but who cares, it was great to see the guys again.

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  5. Jim, I try to limit my trips to 1-1/2 hours when playing after the ride. Of course my annual trip to MB is a 7 hour ride of 1 hour flight. Normally, that’s as far as I will travel for golf.

    Thanks,

    Brian

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