Boutique golf courses that cater to the world’s growing recreational golf market has boomed in the last 20 years, creating a Tassie trail of luxury courses that offer the experienced player skilled games overlooking some of the best scenery in the world.

Three Tasmanian golf courses appeared in the top 10 best Australian Golf courses released last week by Golf Australia magazine.

The top 100 list ranked King Island course Cape Wickham as third in Australia, with Barnbougle and Lost Farm recording fifth and ninth spots respectively.

The top 100 courses also included Tasmanian Golf Course in Hobart in 99th spot.

Barnbougle general manager Penelope Sattler said her family established Barnbougle Dunes and Lost Farm in 2004 and 2010 respectively on their working farm at Bridport.

“We had a few people from America visit and they all expressed that it was a beautiful spot and that it would make a really great golf course and it kind of went from there,” she said.

Today, Barnbougle Dunes and Lost Farm attract droves of local, national and international clients, most of whom are repeat visitors.

“When we started there wasn’t really anyone else doing it, there wasn’t anyone else who had a links golf course overlooking the ocean,” Ms Sattler said.

However in recent years the coastal links golf course has sprung up in other places in Tasmania, particularly on King Island, in Tasmania’s North-West, with the recently developed Cape Wickham and Ocean Dunes golf courses.

Ms Sattler said Barnbougle and Lost Farm relied solely on word-of-mouth and the family weren’t sure if it would be successful after its soft launch.

“We thought it might be well rated but we weren’t sure if we’d get the numbers to be sustainable,” she said.

However, the courses have become so popular the club rooms have become too small for the number of visitors each year. 

“We have upgraded the club rooms once already but even now they are too small for the amount of visitors.”

Ms Sattler said there were two types of tourists who visited Barnbougle and Lost Farm.

“You get the people who are here for the tourism side of things, to see Tasmania but then you definitely get people who are just here to play golf.”

Serious golf travellers pay attention to the rankings of courses around the world and travel to where the highly ranked courses are across the world.

“International guests are definitely increasing, we get a lot of people from the US, the UK and from all around Europe, they come and play at the Dunes, then head to MONA and King Island and go home.”

However she said most of the time, when the golf enthusiasts ended up in Tassie, more often than not they stayed, or came back.

Tasmania can rival the highlands of Scotland for being the home of some of the best luxury golf courses in the world.

It claims the title as being the owner of the nation’s oldest golf course – Ratho Farm at Bothwell.

Ratho Farm will also be the owner of Australia’s newest 18-hole golf course when four new holes are opened at the farm this weekend.

The course originally only had 14 holes but recent work has been done to restore the last four holes to enable them to be used.

Greg Ramsay and his family are the owners of Ratho Farm that has been recognised as Australia’s oldest golf course since the 1960s.

Mr Ramsay said golf tourism had long been an ambition of his.

Mr Ramsay said he had worked on golf courses in Scotland and Ireland for a number of years prior to moving back home to Tasmania.

He said it was while working there he believed the idea of golf tourism could be adapted to his home state.

“Golf tourism in Tasmania is not over; it’s only beginning,” he said.

Tasmania has been able to springboard off its natural advantage of being at “the edge of the world” for most international tourists.

Mr Ramsay and Ms Sattler both agreed it was this pristine wilderness and Tasmania’s “clean and green” image that was so sought after by national and international golf tourists.

“In the past there was a trend towards resort-style golf, that was played at resorts with springy, resort turf. Resort golf is a style where you hit the ball high in the air and try to move it towards the target.”

However in recent years there has been a shift back towards link style golf, where you often play in windy conditions, that is perfect for Tasmania’s cool climate coastal areas, that are often at the mercy of the wind.

Link style golf is a more technical type of golf that is played closer to the ground on firm, natural turf and bump the ball towards the target.

“If you look at the recent rankings [by Golf Australia] seven or eight of the top 10 are links courses.”

Mr Ramsay said links was a form of golf that “takes real finesse” and offers challenge to an experienced golfer.

Tasmania’s golf courses are even attracting the attention of the world on the international stage.

Ranks from Golf Digest published in August 2015 listed the top 100 golf courses in the world ranked two of Tasmania’s golf courses among the list.

Barnbougle Dunes only just missed out on the top 10 and finished in 11^th spot.

The article pays homage to Barnbougle’s ‘tremendous’ coastal location and marvelled at its design.

“What is fascinating is the back nine are completely reversed from how Doak [designer] originally routed it,” the article says.

Lost Farm also rates a mention in the rankings, coming in at number 23.

“The design is dramatic and unusual, particularly the par four fifth [hole], a dogleg right along the river, whose blind tee shot brings to mind the 17^th at St Andrews.”

The Tasmanian golf courses were among the likes of Pine Valley, Cypress Point and Augusta National in the US, Royal County in North Ireland and Royal Dornach in Scotland.

Golf tourism in Tasmania does not appear to be slowing down.