Golf de Chiberta

Overview: Golf de Chiberta occupies the Atlantic edge of Anglet, where the course moves between coastal dunes, open links ground and a mature pine forest. The club's visitor information describes it as a mixture of links and inland golf, which is a more useful guide to the round than either label alone. From the second green the sea becomes part of the visual frame, while later holes turn back into the pines and ask for a different kind of control. At about 6,170 yards and par 70, the course is varied rather than relentlessly long. Wind from the ocean can change the correct club and the safe side of a green, while the wooded holes bring narrower lines and different angles into play. Tom Simpson's routing makes the transition between the two landscapes feel deliberate, so Chiberta is best understood as a coastal course with a strong inland half.

History: The club's history begins in 1924, when the company Biarritz Anglet la Forêt acquired 150 hectares of forest and dunes for a golf project. In 1927 Tom Simpson laid out the course facing the Atlantic, with the project associated with the Duke of Windsor. Chiberta hosted the first French professional championships in 1928, and the club's own history records a strong sporting and social role on the Basque coast through the following decade. The current course remains the eighteen-hole Chiberta routing at 104 Boulevard des Plages, distinct from the separate nine-hole Impératrice course at the same golf operation.

Did You Know? The club's own course guide says the second green is already close to the sea, before the routing eventually finishes among the pines. That quick change from maritime openness to forest shelter is the clearest small-scale expression of Chiberta's mixed landscape.