Victoria’s High Country and the adjoining Goulburn Valley region are perhaps the least known of the state’s golfing destinations, despite the number of easily accessible and affordable courses on offer.
Historic towns like Shepparton, Euroa, Mansfield, Glenrowan, Myrtleford and Wangaratta are perhaps more infamous as the places where bushrangers like Ned Kelly, Harry Power and Daniel ‘Mad Dog’ Morgan roamed during the gold rush years of the mid to late 1800s.
In the 21st century the picturesque northeast of Victoria is renowned for its world class food and wine, burgeoning art scene and, of course, natural attractions. Golf is not a major tourism drawcard like other Victorian regions but there are some interesting, and challenging, layouts to be found.
Shepparton, about 150km from the northern outskirts of Melbourne, lies on the banks of the Goulburn River and is today considered the heart of the “food bowl of Australia”.
Golf didn’t arrive in the town until the turn of the century, and it wasn’t until 1922 that the Shepparton Golf Club moved to its current site, on the east bank of the Goulburn River, what was then a “two-and-a-half mile” trek out of town. A nine-hole sand scrape course was laid out, and another five holes added in 1926. The course was extended to 18 holes in 1932 after the club purchased 20 acres of adjoining land, and this is where the opening five holes and the par-5 9th hole of the current course now lie.
By the mid-1950s Sam Berriman was a highly regarded golf course architect who was the creative mind behind new designs at Cranbourne, Keysborough and Southern. He had also overseen the construction of Charles Alison’s Huntingdale design. In 1956, the call came from Shepparton to create a new 18-hole grass green layout across its rolling property.
Berriman faced a landscape with far more elevation change than any of his Melbourne creations. It is testament to his fine work that the bones of his design remain more than 60 years after the layout officially opened for play.
One of the standout observations of Berriman’s work here is the quality of the dogleg holes. There’s a good mix of right-to-left and left-to-right holes of varying degrees, which have mostly been created to camber beautifully across the rolling terrain. The short par-4 6th is a fine example where you are faced with a blind tee shot but the key to playing the hole well is hitting into the right side of the fairway to allow for the right-to-left sloping fairway. For the second shot, there is every chance your ball will be lying above your feet and, for right-handers, this brings the back left greenside bunker well into play.
As you walk to the 10th tee, you will pass a grass tree and plaque honouring the late Jarrod Lyle, who sadly lost his battle with leukemia in 2018, aged just 36. The fun-loving married father-of-two learned the game at Shepparton and would become its champion golfer before turning professional and, ultimately, heading to the PGA Tour.
It only takes one round at Shepparton – with its twisting fairways, smallish greens and the need for a devilishly good short game – to realise how Lyle honed his silky-smooth action to become such an accurate ball-striker.
Lying on the western side of the Goulburn River, and about nine kilometres to the south of Lyle’s home course, is the Mooroopna Golf Club, which dates to 1929.
Like Shepparton, it began as a nine-hole sand scrape course and was expanded to 18 holes not long after World War II before being converted to grass in 1966. But the biggest changes to the course have all been modern ones.
Starting in 2003, the club undertook a six-year rebuild of its greens, as well as laying couch on all its fairways. More recently, three new holes – the 12th, 13th and 14th – have been created on the north-eastern edge of the property. The landscape surrounding these new holes is quite sparse, which is in stark contrast to the more established, densely tree-lined remainder of the course.
Two of Mooroopna’s most memorable holes are par-3s. The 166-metre 7th features water in front of the tee and flows into a bigger billabong lining the right side of the hole. Water isn’t the only hazard here with two bunkers nestled in close to the putting surface.
Water and sand are also a factor on the 195-metre 17th hole, which also features an updated green complex. A pond lies left of the hole, but it is the bunkers short and left of the putting surface that will grab the miscued tee shot.
Venture further west for 15 minutes via the Midland Highway to Tatura and the Hill Top Golf & Country Club, which lies on the edge of a 1990s created residential estate where street names like Sunningdale, Birkdale, Seminole and Augusta pay homage to the game.
The course dates back to the mid-1960s and was originally created by Eric Horne, who previously designed several courses across southern Victoria including Portarlington. The subdivision of building lots around the edge of the course secured the future of the club.
The 1990s development, on the northern edge of the course, saw the creation of five new front nine holes – from the par-5 4th to the short par-4 8th – designed by Peter Thomson, Mike Wolveridge and Ross Perrett.
The most challenging of Hill Top’s par-3s is found among this quintet. At 148 metres, the 6th is reachable for all but with a lake in play to the left and two bunkers short and right of the upturned dish putting surface, an accurate tee shot is a must here.
The aforementioned 8th hole has claims as the best of Hill Top’s short par-4s. Standing on the tee, you need to decide if you are brave enough to take an aggressive line down the left half of the dogleg left fairway. This playing line brings a large bunker and lake into play, but if you find the Legends couch fairway safely, you are left with the easier approach shot into the massive double green shared with the 4th hole.
The heritage town of Euroa, about 50km south of Shepparton, lies at the base of the beautiful Strathbogie Ranges. It was here in 1878 that Ned Kelly and his gang went into hiding after robbing the National Bank in Euroa. They emerged a week later and, in an attempted robbery of the Bank of Victoria in Shepparton, an angry female customer wielding an umbrella thwarted the hold up by hitting Kelly repeatedly over the head.
Nearly 30 years after those raids, the Euroa Golf Club was formed and a nine-hole sand scrape course was laid out by Melbourne golf professional Rowley Banks, who would later design the first Woodlands and Portarlington Golf Club layouts.
There have been several moves around town since, but the current Euroa course was set out by acclaimed architect Vern Morcom in 1948 and is identical to his original plan with the exception of the bunkers he envisioned. Bunkers were abandoned by the club after just a few years as the local creek sand was unsuitable and they were changed to grassy hollows.
Euroa today is a pretty course – thick with a wide variety of tree species, although dominated by gums, especially Red and Lemon-Scented – while natural and interesting undulations, affecting shot choices, come into play on several holes.
One such hole is the 334-metre par-4 7th where the straight heavily tree-lined fairway dips and rolls through a small depression before rising again to the small bentgrass-covered green. The challenge here is avoiding the long branches of a huge Red gum – just short and right of the green – that reach into the fairway with seemingly only one thing in mind … catching your approaching ball.
A picturesque 25-minute drive southeast of Euroa will have you in the car park of the Strathbogie Golf Club, which celebrates its centenary this year.
The town has a population of around 300. There’s a general store with a café, a war memorial and the golf club, which boasts a small but passionate membership who voluntarily look after the course like it is their own.
The club, particularly in recent times, has benefitted from the incredible generosity of several Melbourne clubs, who have provided second-hand machinery and turf as well as architectural and agronomic advice.
So, bearing this in mind, don’t turn up to play Strathbogie expecting perfectly manicured fairways. Golf here is raw. It is what you might expect if perhaps magically transported back to the game’s formative years. Like me, you might even find a small flock of sheep wandering aimlessly across the 6th fairway having escaped through the fence from an adjoining paddock to gnaw on a better-quality couch grass.
In saying all that, the putting surfaces and immediate surrounds at Strathbogie are good and the fairways aren’t bad to hit off, which is a tip of the hat to the club’s volunteers. What is impressive is the routing, which takes full advantage of its undulating location in the Strathbogie Ranges.
The current course only dates back to the 1980s when the club was forced to move across the road from its original home of more than 65 years. Wangaratta-based golf professional, clubmaker and course designer Dick Pendlebury staked out the new layout, although some holes were later redesigned by Commonwealth Golf Club professional Bill Edgar.
To Edgar’s credit, three of Strathbogie’s best holes – the 15th, 16th and 17th – are his design work. The 127-metre par-3 17th is a beauty with the challenge belying its diminutive stature. The hole is played across the side of a hill with the green terraced into the slope. A miscued tee shot to the right here and your ball could bound tens of metres down the hill and well away from the elevated green.
Pendlebury’s best work remains his design at the Jubilee Golf Club, a leisurely 75-minute drive northeast from Strathbogie to the western outskirts of Wangaratta.
Like so many of the courses featured here, Jubilee began as a sand scrape course and, after three decades of play, moved to its present location in 1963. English-born Pendlebury oversaw the routing and construction of the layout across the foothill of a range through Warby-Ovens National Park. It is a beautiful location and Pendlebury took full advantage of the hillside terrain to provide challenging golf as well as outstanding views. There are several holes that offer strong doses of both, but the 475-metre par-5 5th hole is, for mine, the best of them all.
The long, snaking fairway is one of the highest on the course providing great views towards the distant Great Dividing Range where snow covers the peaks in winter. The undulating fairway has two gentle doglegs that lead to an elevated two-tiered green protected by a bunker front right. Wild hitting golfers can run into trouble here if they spray their second shot too far left toward a large dam.
Pendlebury’s design is very good and was a real surprise to this first-time visitor to the course. I was just as impressed with presentation of the fairways (the club is in the process of converting all to Santa Ana couch) and the bentgrass greens. It blows the mind a little to think this course is prepared by two full-time greens staff with the help of volunteers.
Jubilee is one of two courses to be found in Wangaratta, with the oldest club to be found just eight minutes’ drive closer to town.
Wangaratta Golf Club covers rolling terrain north of town and beside the Yarrawonga Rd heading north towards the Murray River holiday haven.
The club dates back to 1906 when it was laid out on the grounds of the historic Waldara Homestead, which later became the clubhouse before being sold by the club in 2020. Further, a trio of holes were also sold to developers and the land used for a residential development that has helped finance the construction of a new clubhouse, an undercover driving range, which is operational 24 hours a day, and three new holes.
One of those new holes opens the round at Wangaratta and it has easily lived up to expectations as a strategic starter. The 256-metre par-4 appears fairly straightforward as you stand on the tee but a lake to the right pinches well into the fairway, narrowing the hole significantly, unless you are brave enough to try and hit a long tee shot beyond the edges of the hazard. If successful, this will leave a short pitch into the upturned saucer shaped green and a chance at an opening birdie.
Heading southeast out of town leads you through rich wine-growing areas and on toward Victoria’s Alpine high country via Myrtleford, about 40 minutes’ drive from Wangaratta.
Myrtleford Golf Club is situated in the Ovens Valley along the Barwidgee Creek and is surrounded by hills of covered by dense native bush. Some holes offer picturesque views of Mt. Buffalo, while others are lined by massive River gums that date back hundreds of years.
The creek, which is apparently rich with trout, lies left of the fairway on the 400-metre par-4 15th hole. Rated the hardest hole on the course, the tee shot here must find the left half of the fairway – flirting with the stream – to enjoy a shorter, more direct line into the green for the second shot. really only comes into play on one hole.
Myrtleford is a little-known gem where $35 will get you an entertaining and challenging 18 holes played on nicely presented couch fairways and bentgrass greens, with scenic mountain views. It would be great value for money at twice the price.
Continuing your ascent into the mountains via the Great Alpine Way will, after about 25 minutes, lead you to Bright Country Golf Club at the foot of the Victorian Alps.
The club dates to 1909 and for decades golf was played across the steep, privately owned land in the area. But a new home on generally flat land for the club was established and the first nine holes opened for play in 1989. The remaining holes opened within three years.
Designed by Tony Cashmore – who created The Dunes and Thirteenth Beach’s Beach and Creek layouts – the course covers land that was a pine plantation for many years before it was wiped out by a massive bushfire in the early 1980s. Cashmore has produced a high-country gem where the golf is as memorable as the surrounding alpine views.
Venture a little further into the hills and you will find Mt Beauty Golf Club, a windy 40-minute drive away. Forget the windy, mountain drive … it’s worth it as this place is beauty by name, beauty by nature.
Of all the courses featured on this high-country road trip, this par-72 features the most dramatic elevation changes as you navigate holes laid out across beautiful rolling terrain wedged between the base of Mt Beauty and the village that shares its name. Then there are the magnificent views from most holes to Mt Bogong – Victoria’s highest mountain at 1,986 metres – and West Peak.
One such hole is the 2nd, a challenging 341-metre par-4 where finding the left half of the fairway is a must and then you must take enough club to successfully carry your ball all the way up the hill to the green. Playing this hole in winter or very early spring brings out the best in the view with snow covering the peaks in the distance beyond the green.
The hole I liked the most was the all-or-nothing 141-metre par-3 17th. By all-or-nothing I mean the green is terraced into the side of a steep hill, and any miscued shot to the right of the putting surface will bound away back down the slope leaving a blind, uphill pitch to the small green. The conversative play is to aim to the left edge of the green so even a slightly offline tee shot will land safely or get a helpful kick towards the flag.
WHERE TO PLAY
SHEPPARTON GC
Green fee: $45 (18 holes, seven days).
MOOROOPNA GC
Green fee: $40 (18 holes, seven days).
HILL TOP G&CC
Green fee: $40 (18 holes, seven days).
EUROA GC
Green fee: $30 (18 holes, seven days).
STRATHBOGIE GC
Green fee: $30 (per day).
JUBILEE GC
Green fee: $40 (18 holes, seven days).
WANGARATTA GC
Green fee: $30 (18 holes, seven days).
MYRTLEFORD GC
Green fee: $35 (18 holes, seven days).
BRIGHT CGC
Green fee: $45 (18 holes, seven days).
MT BEAUTY GC
Green fee: $35 (per day).
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