Few public courses anywhere can claim a résumé like Port Royal Golf Course. Owned by the Bermuda Government and set on the island’s southwestern shore in Southampton Parish, the Robert Trent Jones Sr. design has welcomed major champions to the PGA Grand Slam of Golf and, since 2019, the PGA Tour to the Butterfield Bermuda Championship. Yet it remains a course that visitors can simply book and play, and its cliff-top 16th hole is among the most recognizable par 3s in golf.
The History of Port Royal Golf Course
Bermuda’s government announced plans for a new public course in 1965, and the project was originally meant to open in late 1967. Land issues slowed progress, and the course did not open until 1970. By then, Robert Trent Jones Sr. was at the peak of his profession, and he produced a routing that uses the natural contours of the land and the island’s ever-present wind as its main defenses.
Those land complications ended up shaping the course’s most famous feature. The rerouting required by land agreements led to the placement of the 16th hole on the cliffs above the Atlantic, creating the signature shot that now defines Port Royal.
When it opened, the course measured 6,531 yards. Today it plays to around 6,800 yards at par 71, making it one of the shortest courses on the PGA Tour schedule. Its modest length is deceptive: the wind can change the character of the course from one day to the next.
The Famous 16th
The 16th is a par 3 of up to 235 yards, with both the tee and the green perched on cliffs above the Atlantic. Between them lies a chasm where waves break against the rock, and the shot is a full carry over open water. Four sets of tees give players of different abilities a way to take it on, but no tee box removes the wind from the equation.
Tour players have spoken about how dramatically the breeze alters club selection at Port Royal. Aaron Wise told the PGA Tour that if the wind flips to the opposite direction, a ball can travel 50 yards shorter or longer than it did the previous day. Nowhere is that more obvious than on the 16th.
The 2009 Renovation
By the 2000s, the course was in need of significant investment. A renovation carried out between 2007 and 2009, at a reported cost of $14.5 million, was led by Roger Rulewich, who had worked on Jones’s original design team. The project improved the greens and drainage and refined the bunkering while preserving the strategic character of the 1970 layout. Port Royal officially reopened on July 21, 2009.
The timing was significant. The renovated course immediately stepped onto the world stage as host of the PGA Grand Slam of Golf, the season-ending exhibition for the year’s major champions, which had moved to Bermuda in 2007 at the Mid Ocean Club before shifting to Port Royal. The event stayed at Port Royal from 2009 through 2014, with winners including Lucas Glover, Ernie Els, Keegan Bradley, Pádraig Harrington, Adam Scott and Martin Kaymer.
Home of the Butterfield Bermuda Championship
Port Royal became a regular PGA Tour venue in 2019, when the Bermuda Championship debuted as an opposite-field event. It was elevated to a full-field official event after pandemic travel restrictions affected the tour’s schedule in Asia, and it took on its current name, the Butterfield Bermuda Championship, in 2021. Port Royal has hosted every edition.
The champions so far:
- 2019: Brendon Todd (24 under)
- 2020: Brian Gay (15 under, won in a playoff)
- 2021: Lucas Herbert (15 under)
- 2022: Séamus Power (19 under)
- 2023: Camilo Villegas (24 under)
- 2024: Rafael Campos (19 under)
- 2025: Adam Schenk (12 under)
No player has yet won the event twice. Winning totals have ranged from 24 under to 12 under, a spread that reflects how much the conditions can change from year to year. The 2026 Butterfield Bermuda Championship is scheduled for October 22-25 at Port Royal.
Playing Port Royal Golf Course
As one of only two public courses in Bermuda, Port Royal is open to visitors, which makes it one of the more accessible tour venues in the region. Players should expect the wind to dictate strategy for most of the round. A shorter course on the scorecard can feel much longer in practice, and the 16th rewards anyone who has saved their best swing for the moment they need it most.
More than five decades after it opened, Port Royal has become Bermuda’s most visible golf course, a public layout that has hosted major champions and tour winners alike while still welcoming the everyday golfer to one of the finest settings in the Atlantic.