Royal Spring Golf Course

Few golf settings anywhere in the world can match what surrounds this course. Royal Spring sits beside the famous Dal Lake in Srinagar, framed by the Zabarwan Hills and the broader sweep of the Kashmir Valley — a landscape that has drawn poets, emperors, and travelers for centuries. The Mughal gardens of Shalimar and Nishat are practically neighbors, and the Himalayan peaks visible on clear days provide a backdrop that renders the act of lining up a putt genuinely surreal.

The course is managed by the Jammu & Kashmir Golf Association and has hosted professional events on the PGTI (Professional Golf Tour of India) circuit, giving it genuine competitive credentials rather than purely scenic ones. The layout rewards local knowledge — mountain air affects ball flight noticeably, and the greens can be deceptively tricky beneath that calm, picturesque surface.

Playing Royal Spring is as much a cultural experience as a sporting one. Srinagar's houseboat culture, the shikara boats drifting across Dal Lake, and the particular quality of Kashmir's light make this a round few golfers forget, regardless of what they shoot.