Riversdale Beach Golf Course

Masterton sits at the heart of the Wairarapa, the broad agricultural valley east of Wellington separated from the capital by the Rimutaka Range. The region is better known for its pinot noir and sheep country than for golf, but it supports a genuine local golfing community, and Riversdale Beach itself — a small coastal settlement about 40 kilometres east of town on the Pacific-facing Wairarapa coast — offers one of the more distinctive playing environments in the lower North Island.

A coastal layout exposed to the wind patterns that roll in off Palliser Bay and the wider Pacific, Riversdale Beach Golf Course rewards local knowledge. Links-style conditions can appear almost without warning on this stretch of coast, where the sea breeze stiffens in the afternoon and firm, fast turf is more the rule than the exception on a dry Wairarapa summer.

For visiting golfers, this is destination golf in the understated New Zealand tradition — uncrowded, unhurried, and framed by scenery that a scorecard cannot begin to describe.