Barbados is the most complete golf destination in the Caribbean. St Lucia is the most beautiful island in the Eastern Caribbean, period, with two courses that use that beauty intelligently. Combining them requires a forty-five minute inter-island flight that costs around £80 each way — and produces a ten-day trip with genuine variety.
**Barbados: the golf foundation**
Barbados has four courses worth serious consideration: Royal Westmoreland (Robert Trent Jones Jr, consistently ranked best in the Caribbean, 7,045 yards, green fee USD 220), Sandy Lane Country Club (three courses — Country Club, Old Nine, and the headline Green Monkey, designed by Tom Fazio and restricted to Sandy Lane hotel guests at USD 350 per round), Apes Hill Golf Club (elevated, cooler, views of both Caribbean coasts from the ridge, green fee USD 175), and Barbados Golf Club (the accessible, less expensive option — green fee USD 110).
We base in the west coast — Holetown or Sandy Lane area — for five nights. The west coast has the calm Caribbean Sea; the east coast has the Atlantic and the dramatic, wave-battered Scotland District. We always do one east coast drive, down through Bathsheba to the Soup Bowl (a famous surf break), and back. Not golf, but important.
Our four Barbados rounds: Royal Westmoreland twice (it earns it), Apes Hill, and either Sandy Lane Country Club or Barbados Golf Club depending on budget.
**The flight to St Lucia**
LIAT Airlines or Caribbean Airlines, BDS to UVF (Hewanorra). Forty-five minutes. The approach into Hewanorra — descending between twin volcanic peaks (the Pitons) with the Caribbean glittering below — is one of the great flight approaches on earth. Clients who have seen it from their seat window tend to lower their phone before landing.
**St Lucia: Sandals Regency Golf Resort and St Lucia Golf and Country Club**
St Lucia has two courses. St Lucia Golf and Country Club at Cap Estate in the north is the better of the two — a 6,800-yard course in surprisingly good condition with views across the northern tip of the island to Martinique. Green fee USD 120 including club hire if needed.
Sandals Regency Golf Course is accessible to non-Sandals guests at USD 95 with shared cart. Less dramatic than Cap Estate but a pleasant morning round with good infrastructure.
We stay at Ladera Resort in the south — fourteen miles from Cap Estate, which requires a transfer, but Ladera is one of the hotels in the world that justifies its inconvenience. Open-walled suites with the Pitons as your permanent view, an infinity pool at altitude, a restaurant that has won awards for twenty consecutive years. The transfer to the golf course is forty-five minutes of Saint Lucian landscape. Nobody complains.
**The economics**
Ten nights (five Barbados, five St Lucia), inter-island flight, all transfers, four rounds Barbados and two rounds St Lucia: approximately £3,800 to £4,400 per person at four and five-star level. Flights from London to Barbados are typically £600–900 return depending on booking window.
**January through April**
The Eastern Caribbean dry season runs December through May. January, February, and March are the peak months — reliably dry, trade winds cooling the golf courses, sea calm enough for snorkelling. Avoid September and October, which is peak hurricane season even if the probability of direct impact is lower than people fear.
**The honest reason this works**
Ten nights in Barbados alone is too long. Barbados is excellent, but it's small — by day eight you've seen it. Ten nights in St Lucia alone and you've played both courses twice and are wondering what else to do. Combining them at five each gives you exactly enough time in both places and the inter-island flight is the kind of travel that feels like a bonus experience rather than a transit.
James Whitmore
Golf Travel Specialist · View profile →
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