How to Play the Best Golf in Hampshire

The short answer

Hampshire's best golf splits into three clusters. On the coast east of Portsmouth sits Hayling, a genuine links of 1883 recast by J H Taylor in 1905 and Tom Simpson in 1933, the only true links on the south coast between Rye in Sussex and the far southwest. Along the eastern county border runs a heathland belt to rival parts of Surrey at a fraction of the fee: Arthur Croome's Liphook, Harry Colt's Blackmoor and North Hants at Fleet, the club that raised Justin Rose. And in the New Forest, Brokenhurst Manor and the Willie Park Jr parkland of Stoneham round out a week.

Every one of these is a members club that welcomes visitors with a little planning. Hayling runs an online visitor tee sheet and asks for an active handicap, the heathland clubs favor weekdays, and none demands the letters of introduction you meet at the most private clubs elsewhere. Book Hayling and Liphook first and the rest of a Hampshire trip falls into place around them.

How access works, course by course

Hayling is the one to plan around. Laid out by Tom Dunn in 1883 and shaped into its present form by J H Taylor and then Tom Simpson, it is a fast running, low slung links among the dunes and shingle of Hayling Island, with the Solent on three sides and a sea breeze that turns a 6,531 yard par 71 into a full examination. The club sells visitor times through its own online booking and asks for an active handicap, so secure the date first and build the rest of the trip behind it.

The eastern heath belt is the value of southern England. Liphook, begun by Arthur Croome and finished after his death by his partner Tom Simpson, opened its full eighteen in 1923 and is as pure a piece of heathland architecture as anything over the Surrey border, with day rates from around 100 to 160 pounds in 2026. Ten minutes north, Blackmoor is Harry Colt at his quiet best, a 1913 design where sixteen of his original holes still play today, and North Hants at Fleet carries revisions by Colt and Simpson on its Braid bones along with the name of its most famous member, Justin Rose. All three favor weekday visitors and sit within twenty minutes of each other along the A3 corridor.

For the third leg, head west. Brokenhurst Manor is Harry Colt deep in the New Forest, a secluded course where the forest's ponies and deer wander the fringes, and Stoneham, Willie Park Jr's rolling parkland heath outside Southampton, makes a fine opening or closing round. Base in Liphook or Petersfield for the heath, or in Lymington or Brockenhurst for the forest and the coast; London is barely more than an hour up the A3, so Hampshire also works as a two day add to a Surrey or London golf trip. Play May to September for the firmest turf, with April and October the quiet value window.