Alvaiázere, Portugal, Oct. 17, 2025 (Lusa) - Disc golf, a sport similar to golf that uses a plastic disc instead of a ball, is Alvaiázere's bet in the district of Leiria to attract foreign tourism, as part of a strategy that includes the Sicó region.
On Saturday, the municipality inaugurates the Carrascal Disc Golf Course in the Mata do Carrascal Botanical Park. It's another step in the plan drawn up a year and a half ago, the mayor of Alvaiázere, João Paulo Guerreiro, told Lusa.
"We saw great potential in disc golf - one of the world's fastest-growing sports - not least because it's a sport that's widely practised in North America and Northern Europe. And in the winter, players end up coming south in search of climatic conditions to practise this sport."
It is this influx of sports tourism that the municipality wants to attract by adding a new course to the existing offer at the Valle D'Encanto Disc Golf Park complex, located four kilometres from Alvaiázere, in the town centre from Saturday.
The private project, which has been operating for a year, caters for disc golf beginners and professionals.
Since it opened, more than 500 players have played there from countries such as the United States of America, Canada, Porto Rico, New Zealand, Russia, Finland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark, where the sport is well established.
"About a year and a half ago, we went [to an international competition in Finland] to realise the potential, both in terms of sport and tourism. And we realised that they are immense," said João Paulo Guerreiro.
"Disc golf generates hundreds of millions of euros every year" and Alvaiázere intends to enter this circuit.
"If we can get a small slice of that, it would be very important for our territory." With just over 6,000 inhabitants in the municipality, "we have to take advantage of these niches and opportunities to differentiate ourselves," added the mayor.
Disc golf reached Alvaiázere through two Swedes who practised the sport and settled there. They were looking for a place to set up a course and spoke to Amaral Carvalho, the owner of the land where the Valle D'Encanto Disc Golf Park now stands, in the town of Marzugueira.
The first course was so well received that there are now four on 13 of the property's 15 hectares: three with 18 holes (or baskets) and another with nine. They are designed for professional players, amateurs, beginners and children. One is being developed for people with reduced mobility.
The project includes a 5-star hotel, the construction of which should "begin within a year", explained Amaral Carvalho.
The combination of disc golf and a teaching farm allows players to meet "baby donkeys, goats and other animals along the course". While playing, "you can pick nuts, fruit, tangerines" or understand how cork is removed or olives picked.
"It's a completely different sensory experience" which, he emphasised, aims to place Alvaiázere and the region as "an Iberian disc golf benchmark".
The reactions of golfers to their visit to Alvaiázere led the municipality to create the Carrascal Disc Golf Course.
"They came from all over, and the feedback was very positive. This led us to make a public investment," said João Paulo Guerreiro.
The mayor believes that disc golf can be "a great lever, both in terms of tourism and sport" for the municipality, but not only.
"We have very interesting economic studies and studies on the number of players. We're going to try to go one step further here, both in Alvaiázere and in the Sicó region. It was important that we had something more on offer and it was important that the municipalities in the region could realise this and create a cluster here," he concluded.
Coinciding with the course's inauguration, Valle D'Encanto Disc Golf Park is hosting the national disc golf championship this weekend, featuring 42 players.
MLE/ADB // ADB.
Lusa
