Golf du Château de Cheverny

Few settings in French golf are quite as theatrical as this one. The course occupies the grounds of the Domaine de Cheverny, playing through the formal woodland estate that surrounds the 17th-century Château de Cheverny — one of the Loire Valley's best-preserved and most visited Renaissance châteaux, and the real-life inspiration for Moulinsart, the ancestral home of Tintin's Captain Haddock in Hergé's famous comic series. Mature oaks and chestnuts frame nearly every hole, and the château itself appears as a backdrop at several points on the round, making it difficult to keep your mind entirely on the game.

The Loir-et-Cher sits at the heart of château country, where the Loire and its tributaries cut through flat, forested terrain. The landscape lends itself naturally to parkland golf — tree-lined, quiet, and unhurried — and the course reflects that character: a genuine country-estate layout rather than a resort showpiece.

For visiting golfers, the combination of a serious round and a château tour makes for a full and worthwhile day in one of France's most culturally rich corners.