Destination guide
Belek
Ten golf clubs on one stretch of Mediterranean coast, all within forty kilometres of the airport. This is what a society needs to know before booking it.
Why Belek
Everything within twenty minutes of everything else.
The geography
Belek is a twelve-kilometre strip of pine forest and sand between the Taurus mountains and the Mediterranean. The courses were built into the forest, not cleared out of it, so most holes are framed by mature pine.
The logistics
Nothing is far. The furthest club is forty kilometres from the airport; the closest is twenty-five. A group can play a different course every morning and never spend more than half an hour on a coach.
The catch
July and August are hot months for golf. Early tee times and a lighter schedule may suit your group better. Summer inclusions vary by hotel and club; confirm your specific arrangements in the written quote.
The courses
Ten clubs. Every one of them, with its distance.
Ordered by distance from Antalya Airport, because that is the number that decides what time your coach leaves.
| Club | Courses | Holes | From AYT |
|---|---|---|---|
| Antalya Golf ClubDavid Jones with European Golf Design · 2002 · PGA National Türkiye | PGA Sultan · Pasha | 36 | 25 km |
| National Golf ClubDavid Feherty & David Jones · opened 1994 · Belek’s first | Irmak · Tuna | 18 | 25 km |
| Cullinan LinksEuropean Golf Design · reopened 2021 | Aspendos · Olympos | 36 | 26 km |
| Kaya PalazzoGolf Med with David Jones · opened 2007 | Championship course | 18 | 27 km |
| Carya Golf ClubPeter Thomson · opened 2008 · all 18 floodlit | Championship course | 18 | 28 km |
| Sueno Golf ClubAndrew Craven · opened 2007 | Pines 18 · Dunes 18 | 36 | 30 km |
| Cornelia Golf ClubSir Nick Faldo | King · Queen · Prince | 27 | 35 km |
| Montgomerie Maxx RoyalColin Montgomerie with European Golf Design | Championship course | 18 | 35 km |
| Gloria Golf ClubMichel Gayon · opened 1997 | Old 18 · New 18 · Verde 9 | 45 | 40 km |
| Robinson NobilisDave Thomas | Championship course | 18 | 40 km |
Eight course guides so far, each with the scorecard where the club has one: Cullinan Links · Kaya Palazzo · Sueno · Gloria · Montgomerie Maxx Royal · Carya · National · Antalya Golf Club
Two more clubs in Belek
Cornelia and Robinson Nobilis do not have their own guide pages yet. In short:
Cornelia Golf Club: twenty-seven holes by Sir Nick Faldo, sold as three eighteen-hole combinations. King is holes 1–18, Queen is 10–27, Prince is 19–27 followed by 1–9. All three play to par 72.
King 6,373 m · Queen 6,411 m · Prince 6,324 m. Queen is the longest of the three by 87 metres; Prince is the shortest.
The three nines measure 3,143 m (1–9), 3,230 m (10–18) and 3,181 m (19–27). Queen is the longest combination by 87 metres; Prince is the shortest.
The club has 75 bunkers, greens averaging 600 m², Bermuda turf overseeded for winter, a 4,800 m² clubhouse with pro shop, a double-sided driving range, two putting greens and three chipping greens, the Cornelia Golf Academy with TrackMan, and a free shuttle from the Cornelia hotels. Twelve rental sets, left- and right-handed. The signature hole is the seventh, Faldo’s Choice.
Robinson Nobilis Golf Club: eighteen holes of parkland, with the Nobilis Golf Academy, equipment rental, green-fee packages and a shuttle to surrounding courses as well as its own, which helps if your week is spread across several clubs. It is part of the five-star Robinson Club Nobilis.
For both, we confirm the scorecard, green-fee bands and maintenance dates with the club before building a trip around them.
Three in depth
Different courses, different societies.
A group with a spread of handicaps and a group of single-figure players want opposite things. These three cover the range, and the third has the shortest walk to a first tee in Belek.
Cullinan Links
Thirty-six holes on one estate, Aspendos and Olympos, with a hotel five minutes’ walk from the first tee. A shared buggy comes with the round, and eighteen of the thirty-six holes are floodlit, so a group landing at lunchtime still plays. The two are not twins: Aspendos is par 72 and 416 metres longer off the whites.
Montgomerie Maxx Royal
A European Tour venue on a hundred hectares of pine forest. Longer, sandier and more demanding: 6,522 metres off the black tees and fifty-four bunkers. Societies play the yellows at 5,527 m, which keeps it honest without turning it into a slog. The back nine plays under lights.
Kaya Palazzo
Eighteen holes and nine lakes, with two five-star hotels a hundred and fifty metres from the clubhouse. The club has its own scorecard and an official Turkish Golf Federation rating, which most in Belek do not. One caution: the handicap limit is 28 for men and 36 for women, tighter than the others here, and we confirm it with the club for your dates.
Where to stay
In Belek, the hotel and the course come as a pair.
Almost every Belek hotel is attached to a golf club, and that pairing decides your mornings. Two hotels can share the same course and still mean a five-minute walk for one group and a coach for the other.
| Hotel | Plays at | Getting to the tee |
|---|---|---|
| Cullinan BelekOpened 2022 · 544 rooms · ultra all-inclusive | Cullinan Links | 5 minutes on foot |
| Titanic Deluxe Golf BelekOpened 2013 · deluxe all-inclusive | Cullinan Links | Resort shuttle |
| Maxx Royal BelekGolf resort | Montgomerie Maxx Royal | On the estate |
| Regnum Carya · The Crown557 + 358 · luxury all-inclusive · golf is extra | Carya Golf Club | On the estate |
| Cornelia DiamondGolf resort & spa | Cornelia Golf Club | On the estate |
| Gloria Golf · Serenity · Verde1,175 rooms · hotel check-in 06.00, check-out 19.00 | Gloria Golf Club | On the estate |
| Kempinski The Dome228 rooms · the course is inside the hotel boundary | Antalya Golf Club | Adjacent |
| Sirene Belek HotelSister company of the club · free transfers to two courses | Antalya Golf Club | Walking distance |
| Sueno Golf · Sueno Deluxe174 + 426 rooms · one of them is the clubhouse | Sueno Pines & Dunes | On it · 400 m |
| Kaya Palazzo · Kaya BelekBoth 150 m from the course | Kaya Palazzo | On the estate |
On "all inclusive"
Belek all-inclusive is generous: buffets, snack restaurants, branded spirits, bar service at the pool and beach. But à la carte restaurants are usually charged and often carry a table fee, and so is room service.
The one that catches groups
À la carte kitchens stop taking orders early; at one property, last orders are 20:30. If your prize-giving runs long, the kitchen has closed. Book the room, not just the table.
Room sharing
Standard rooms in Belek are large by UK standards: 34 m² at one property, taking three adults. Useful to know before you price the single supplements.
Choosing your week
Belek plays all year. The weeks are not equal.
Most operators will sell you any week you ask for. We would rather tell you which ones a society enjoys, including the ones we would steer you away from.
| Month | Avg. high | Rain | For a society |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 15 °C | 13 days | Playable, but the wettest stretch of the year |
| February | 16 °C | 11 days | Improving, and the courses are quiet |
| March | 18 °C | 10 days | Season opens. Best value of the year. |
| April | 22 °C | 8 days | Prime. Books out first, so plan early. |
| May | 26 °C | 7 days | Prime. Warm, dry, long evenings. |
| June | 32 °C | 3 days | Early June is fine; after mid-month it is hot work |
| July | 35 °C | 1 day | Family season, not golf season |
| August | 35 °C | 1 day | Family season, not golf season |
| September | 32 °C | 3 days | Cooling through the month; late September is good |
| October | 27 °C | 6 days | Prime. The classic society month. |
| November | 22 °C | 8 days | Still good golf, noticeably cheaper |
| December | 17 °C | 12 days | Mild, but the wettest month of the year |
Temperatures and rain days are 1991–2020 climate normals for the Antalya station, about 30 km west of Belek, rounded to whole degrees. Treat them as a planning guide, not a forecast.
One more sign, from the clubs themselves: the all-inclusive golf package is suspended from mid-June to the end of August. The clubs treat high summer as a different business, and so do we.
For societies and groups
The five things that decide whether the trip runs smoothly.
Handicap limits: check them before you book, not at the first tee
Belek clubs set a maximum handicap, and it is enforced. Cullinan Links allows 36 for men and 44 for women. Other clubs set their own, and we confirm the limit before we quote.
This is the single most common reason a member is turned away on the morning. Run your roster against the limit while you are still collecting deposits.
Buggies: included, optional or compulsory
Policy varies by club and it materially changes the per-head price. At Cullinan Links a shared buggy is included in the concept, with 150 on site. Elsewhere it is an extra, and at some courses in other destinations it is compulsory.
We will tell you which before you quote a figure to your members.
Tee blocks: will the whole group go out together?
In consecutive slots, yes. A group of twenty-four goes out in six fourballs across roughly an hour. A shotgun start puts everyone out at once, but clubs offer it only above a minimum group size and rarely at peak times.
Block-booking hold periods and shotgun minimums vary by club; we confirm them as part of the quote.
How much golf is too much?
The usual mistake is booking four consecutive mornings. It sounds good in February and feels different by day four. The shapes that work: 4 nights / 3 rounds with a rest day in the middle, 5 nights / 4 rounds, or 7 nights / 5 rounds with two rest days.
We will suggest the rest day even though it means selling you one round fewer.
Morning or afternoon tee times?
Mornings in the shoulder months, for daylight. One local detail: at Cullinan Links the wind blows from the north in the morning, off the Taurus mountains, and turns southerly off the sea in the afternoon. The same holes do not play the same way at 08:00 and at 15:00.
Beyond the golf
There is a rest day in every trip worth taking.
A Pamphylian city with roots to around 1000 BC, a Greek harbour town, and Köprülü Canyon, fourteen kilometres long with walls up to four hundred metres. The rest day is covered in full in the Golf Guide.
Aspendos
A Roman theatre built under Marcus Aurelius and still standing virtually intact. Opera and ballet are performed here in spring and summer.
ROMAN · 2ND CENTURY AD
The coast
At least twelve kilometres of it, and nesting grounds for loggerhead turtles.
ON YOUR DOORSTEP
Long evenings
Peak season runs May to October, and Belek’s own tourism association puts March, April and November in play as well.
MARCH TO NOVEMBER
Get a quote
Tell us your dates and your numbers.
Group size, preferred month, how many rounds and the highest handicap in the party. We come back with a written quote, itemised.