Club de Golf Ulzama

Overview: Club de Golf Ulzama is an 18-hole woodland course in the Ulzama valley of Navarra, built among mature oak forest and gently changing ground. Javier Arana's design gives the course a natural sense of enclosure while keeping the fairways wide enough for several different playing strategies. The first nine is more technical and places a premium on finding the correct line through the trees. The second nine opens slightly and gives stronger players more room to use distance, although the underlying demand for accurate approaches remains. A lake and several partially hidden greens create moments that only reveal the full shape of a hole as the player moves through it.

History: Ulzama was founded in 1965 and is one of the established Arana courses in northern Spain. The routing was built to work with the oak woodland of the valley rather than clear it away, producing a course that feels mature and integrated into its surroundings. The club has retained its original character through decades of play, with the tree corridors and broad fairways still defining the relationship between technical golf and the natural setting.

Did You Know? The fourth hole brings a lake into play, while the green on the eighth cannot be seen until the player is close to it. Those two details capture Ulzama's design language: some holes reward a clear plan from the tee, and others keep the key part of the challenge hidden until the final approach.