The biggest and best-known golf course developer in Mexico has inked Greg Norman to design the second course at its biggest and best-known resort.
Norman’s “signature” layout will be among the featured attractions at Nuevo Vallarta, a huge destination resort along Mexico’s western coast, just north of Puerto Vallarta’s international airport. The resort, which includes three miles of beachfront along Banderas Bay, is already home to hundreds of vacation houses, numerous hotels, a 300-slip marina, and shopping areas.
Grupo Vidanta expects to break ground on the new course next year, with a scheduled arrival for all 18 of its holes in the summer of 2013.
“We hope to design and build a golf course that blends with the surrounding natural beauty and looks as though it has been there forever,” said Norman.
Nuevo Vallarta already has one golf course, a nine-hole track affiliated with Grupo Vidanta’s Mayan Palace hotel. In the future, Grupo Vidanta plans to add three more golf courses – all to be “professionally designed” – in an attempt to make Nuevo Vallarta one of Mexico’s premier golf destinations.
Grupo Vidanta says its mission is “to deliver the essence of happiness.” The happiness is delivered via hotels that can be found not just in Nuevo Vallarta but in Acapulco, Los Cabos, Riviera Maya, and other vacation places. (They operate under several brands, including Mayan Palace, Grand Mayan, Grand Luxxe, and Grand Bliss.) The company has even built an international airport, near Puerto Penasco in the state of Sonora.
Grupo Vidanta also owns five golf courses, all of them operated by Vidanta Golf. Its premier properties are Peninsula de Cortes Golf Club in Puerto Penasco, which features an 18-hole layout co-designed by Jack Nicklaus and his son Jack, and El Manglar Golf Course in Riviera Maya, an executive-length layout by Nicklaus Design. Nicklaus Design recently overhauled the existing layout at Nuevo Vallarta, Nayar Golf Course, and will eventually add nine holes to it.
Grupo Vidanta’s other golf holdings include an 18-hole track in Acapulco (Copra Golf Course) and a nine-hole track in Los Cabos (Punta Sur Golf Course).
This story originally appeared in the World Edition of the Golf Course Report, in a slightly different form. For a sample copy of the World Edition, call 301/680-9460 or write to WorldEdition@aol.com.