Blue Bay course opens in Hainan

20 January 2012

Blue Bay's waterfront seventeenth hole

China’s golf hotbed Hainan Island now has another course open for play.

Designed by Mark Hollinger of California-based firm JMP Golf Design, the Jian Lake Blue Bay Golf Club opened on 2 January. Jian Lake Blue Bay is developed by the Shaoxing Jian Lake Group (also the developer of  the Jian Lake club in Shaoxing City), in collaboration with the renowned residential developer Greentown China Group.

The course, which stretches to 7,555 yards, is located directly along a stretch of oceanfront property near the town of Lingshui on the south-eastern coast of Hainan.

“I am very pleased with the seaside tropical environment and interesting character of this golf course. I believe it will present something unique and different for every type of resort golfer and serious travelling player,” said Hollinger.

Blue Bay is grassed entirely Sea Isle 2000 paspalum. It features numerous sand dune waste areas, red sand bunkers, as well as native beach grasses, coconut palm trees and bougainvillea landscape planting bordering many holes. Hollinger says he has designed the course to in a tropical links style, given the major role the wind will play in this coastal location, and that the course’s wooden sleepers, pot bunkers, and fast and firm turf conditions designed to allow for bump and run style approaches will further enhances the links character.

Blue Bay is one of four new JMP courses slated to open in 2012 in China. The clubhouse was designed by US-based architect Dahlin & Associates. The clubhouse and surrounds were landscaped in a tropical style by James Nicolay, based in Honolulu. A new 400-room Westin resort hotel in currently under construction next door.