Royal Dar Es Salam Refurbished, Better Than Ever

RABAT, MOROCCO | Not long after the late King Hassan II of Morocco took up golf in the mid-1960s, he came to believe that the sport could benefit his country, which was very rich when it came to culture, heritage and hospitality, but relatively poor in terms of natural resources. The monarch felt that tourism would bring wealth to his Kingdom. One of the best ways to get travelers to put Morocco on their itineraries was golf. So, he decided to make his country a destination for the game.

The first step was to create the Royal Dar Es Salam Golf Club in Rabat. He hired Robert Trent Jones Sr. as his course architect. The site His Majesty selected was inside a national forest on the outskirts of town, property that featured gently undulating land and vast stands of cork oaks and groves of eucalyptus trees. Eventually, that site came to hold two 18-hole courses, the Red and Blue, and one nine-hole track, the Green. In time, Royal Dar Es Salam was regarded as the finest golf complex on the African continent, and its signature layout, the...