Golfing in Blacktown City Council
On the Cumberland Plain in Sydney's west, Blacktown's two public courses offer quite different days out. Stonecutters Ridge at Colebee is the statement piece: opened in August 2012 as Sydney's first Greg Norman design, it is a par-71 championship layout of 6,257 metres where bunkering, greens and water define the test. It hosted the NSW Open in 2014, 2015 and 2016, and although it sits at the centre of a residential estate, players say the surroundings fade once they are out on the course, with every hole carrying its own identity. Fox Hills Golf Club at Girraween, minutes from the M4, is the more relaxed choice, a public 18-hole, par-72 parkland course of rolling fairways that plays pleasantly for most golfers and stiffens up when you move back to the longer tees.