Veteran travelers may well be surprised by the location being billed as the world’s best golf venue.
“I’m sure Greece wasn’t on the tip of your tongue,” says Bill Hogan, who has been a world course rater for GOLF Magazine for 27 years and is the business development manager for U.S.-based Premier Golf, which specializes in custom travel packages to iconic destinations.
Maybe Ireland, Scotland or New Zealand would come to mind, but Greece, a country known more for olives and Olympics, not necessarily golf and grandeur?
“Some people think, ‘Oh yeah, 5-star golf in Greece; it doesn’t exist, right?’” Hogan said. “Well, it didn’t until about four or five years ago.”
Hogan was at the PGA Show in late January promoting Premier Golf travel packages to Costa Navarino along the southwestern coast of Greece in what some argue is one of the most unspoiled and breathtaking landscapes in the Mediterranean.
The opulent resort in the area of Messinia features four golf courses, four 5-star hotels, 38 restaurants and seven miles of beach.
“It’s an absolutely stunning property,” Hogan said.
And you don’t have to just take Hogan’s word for it. Costa Navarino was a 2024 World Golf Awards winner in three separate categories–world’s best golf venue, Europe’s best golf hotel and world’s best golf clubhouse.
Two of the courses are associated with former Masters champion Jose-Maria Olazabal, while an additional two more were laid out by Robert Trent Jones Jr. and Hall of Fame golfer Bernhard Langer.
Prepare to be pampered on and off the golf course at Costa Navarino, from staff delivering iced towels to players when the temperatures rise into the 90s to a perfectly stacked triangle of Titleist Pro-V1s on the practice range.
“They sent their team over to America and found out all of the best aspects of what the top resorts do and duplicated it,” Hogan said. “Nobody else has caught on yet in Europe to this extent. They’re really, really at the top of the top.
“And they have the best practice facility I’ve ever seen in continental Europe where everything is just so perfectly manicured,” added Hogan. “They do everything right.”
The resorts include The Westin, Mandarin Oriental (with private swimming pools), The Ramanos and W Costa Navarino–all overlooking the Ionian Sea.
The resort is owned by TEMES, a leading investor, developer and operator in the high-end tourism and real estate sector in Greece. TEMES has fulfilled the vision of its founder, Captain Vassilis Constantakopoulos, to establish his homeland Messinia as a top international destination.
Constantakopoulos passed away in 2011.
“He’s an interesting story,” Hogan said. “The Captain was basically an olive picker and came from a poor Greek family. And then he went off and got into shipping and became one of those big Greek shipping magnates. Think Aristotle Onassis, right? He made a ton of money and he always wanted to give back to his home area, create jobs and create tourism infrastructure. A lot of Green tourism occurs on all the islands but he knew there was potential around Navarino Bay. So he started building these places and sending his team around the world to find the best of the best of the best. And, he’s left his legacy.”
The 85-year-old Jones has designed more than 300 golf courses in over 50 countries, but would stack up his picturesque Bay Course at Costa Navarino with any of his top layouts.
“It starts inland and wanders through some changing terrain. And then up a valley and then back down toward the sea,” Jones said. “It’s my style of golf, which means you have to think a shot out before you hit it–you have to think like a chess player.
“It’s worth the trip,” Jones added. “Heck, what’s not to like about Greece. There are all kinds of reasons to be there.”
One unique feature of the Jones course is the first tee shot is executed from the roof of the clubhouse.
“You walk upstairs to tee off, you don’t get out of your golf cart,” Jones said, laughing. “There is a picture of me on the top of the clubhouse hitting the opening shot at 80 years old. You have to be willing to build a several million dollar clubhouse the way we wanted it to happen. For most architects it would have been crazy, but this particular architect and the owner thought it was fun.”
The golfing terrain of the four courses is about as varied as you can get in one concentrated location, Hogan said.
“There are all these coastal hills that the golf courses wind through and almost every single hole of the 72 on property have views of the water,” Hogan said. “Some of them are elevated and then some of them go right down to the beach.”
The property used to be filled with olive groves, and despite all the newness, there is still a touch of Greek culture to enjoy.
“There’s one little village that the resort kind of wraps around and they’ve kept it authentic,” Hogan said. “So you can go down there and they have restaurants where you can actually sit with your feet in the sand and the water splashes in and you can eat. It’s the best of the Greek experiences.”
A direct flight from the East Coast of the United States from locations such as Atlanta or New York takes about nine hours into Athens, which is approximately a 3-hour drive from Costa Navarino.
“Often people will add a couple nights in Athens when they get there to get adjusted to the time zone,” Hogan said. “And then we shuttle them to Costa Navarino.
“The beauty of Costa Navarino is that you might think of it as London or Paris prices, where the resort stay is $2,000 a night? No, they’re not. You’d be pleasantly surprised what a five-night, three-round golf package goes for.”
Premier Golf is hosting its annual PGA Pro-Am here in May 2026 where seven nights of accommodations and five rounds of golf costs $7,130 per golfer.
Hogan was hard pressed to compare Costa Navarino to any other resort in the world.
“First of all, there’s no resort in Europe that has four better golf courses or hotels plus the infrastructure,” he said. “Maybe a place like Hawaii that would have beautiful rooms, fabulous beaches and restaurants, but there is no place like that now that has four golf courses and everything is all linked together like Costa Navarino. It is just top-notch at every turn.”