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Italy, Rome, Parco de 'Medici - A haven for golfers
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FACTS SHERATON GOLF
Location: Between the international airport and the centre of Rome
Number of rooms: 179 rooms and 14 suites in the main building, 92 rooms in the annexe. All rooms have bath / shower / television / telephone / AC/ safes.
Miscellaneous: Restaurant and bar with lighter meals.
Distance to golf course: 0 metres.COURSE FACTS
Golf Club Parco de 'Medici
Course playable: 1989
Architects: David Mezzacane / Peter Fazio / Massimo Manelli
Number of Holes: 18 +9. Par 71
Distance from tees: White tee: 6,303 metres. Yellow tee: 5,908. Red tee: 5,200
North Course
Number of holes: 9 holes
Distance from yellow tee: 2,620 metres. Red: 2,306
Handicap limit: Green card
Distance from hotel: 0 metres
Rating: A typical park course with some water holes that require precision. Moderate difficulty
Combine golf with big city life in Rome. When you tire of crowded streets, search for serenity on the golf course, because it is there that it is really calm.
Parco de 'Medici is located just 15 minutes from Rome's noisy centre and ten minutes from the international airport Leonardo da Vinci. With traffic noise still ringing in our ears, it feels like coming to an oasis when we drive into the Sheraton Golf Parco de 'Medici area. Here there is peace. Where Pope Leo X once had his hunting grounds there are now 27 inviting golf holes since 1989.
For those who want to combine golf with city life in Rome, the Parco de 'Medici is an unbeatable option. The hotel has free buses that take guests to the Piazza Venezia round-trip seven times a day.
It is crowded in Rome but queue-free on the golf course. There are only 40,000 golfers and 240 courses in Italy and they are definitely not here. One reason is that it is expensive to be a member in Italy. At Parco de 'Medici the entry fee is about EUR 37,000, the annual fee EUR 3,168 - One of the reasons that we can play as much as we can manage.
We arrive at the end of October, but in Rome it is verging on high summer. On with the shorts and polo shirt! First we enjoy an Italian buffet on the clubhouse terrace. "Pasta? Vino? Dolce?" Si! we answer. Life is fair. From the sunlit terrace, we have views of the putting green, the greens on hole six, nine and eighteen and the tee of the seventh hole. We can enjoy the fountain cascade of the water hazards, pine trees, cypresses, weeping willows, olive trees and flower arrangements. A quick check of the mobile...No, at it isn’t exactly sitting outside weather...
The flat 18-hole course is a challenge for the average golfer, but even low handicappers should watch out. The greens are soft to be sure but deceptively fast for an inexperienced golfer. And there is a lot of water. Six dams are strategically laid out. The eighteenth hole especially - 505 metres from the yellow tee - requires that you be really focused. The approach to the green is guarded by water on both sides of the green area.
Text :Göran Söderlund
Photo: Christer Höglund