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Our First Golf Trip to Scotland
by Rick Hendershot, The Traveling Weekend
Golfer
 |
I have waited a long
time to summarize our two golfing trips to Scotland. The first one was back
in the summer of 2001. The second was in late June of 2003. My memory of
some of the details is a bit clouded, but the most outstanding bits are as
clear as if they happened yesterday. Our first
trip was the result of a house swap I did with an acquaintance who lived in
Linlithgow -- roughly halfway between Glasgow and Edinburgh. I had registered
our Florida house (we have since sold it -- just before the hurricane in Aug
2004) for swaps on holswap.com and was
getting a fair number of inquiries from people from England and Scotland.
|
The Linlithgow trade sounded perfect. I had done a fair bit of research
and had already decided I wanted to be near enough to St. Andrews to visit, but
was more interested in seeing a few of the more obscure, remote courses.
Linlithgow is roughly 50 miles from St. Andrews.
I was not counting on
playing The Old Course this time around because Judy would not be able to play
with me (official handicaps required), and you have to book too far in advance.
I was more interested in just seeing the town of St. Andrews and walking a bit
on the course.
My real objective was to visit Royal Dornoch three
or so hours north of Edinburgh, and Macrahanish over on the Mull of
Kintyre about as close to Ireland as you can get on mainland Scotland. So I had
booked a two night stay at the Dornoch Castle in the first week, and another two
night stay at a beautiful B&B in Campbelltown about ten miles from
Macrahanish.
We spent the first couple days at Linlithgow seeing the
local sites. The first night there just happened to be a jousting match on the
grounds of the Linlithgow Palace -- an historic ruin that was once the home of
Mary Queen of Scots.
Before leaving for Dornoch on Wednesday I wanted to
play at least one round in the south. The father in law of our host recommended
we go over to North Berwick just south of Muirfield on the east coast (the St.
Andrews side). This gave us the opportunity to scout out the terrain along the
East Lothian coast between Edinburgh and Gullane -- the home of Muirfield.
We played our first round in Scotland at North Berwick. This is
considered a "primitive" links course with quirky features such as blind shots
and walls you have to shoot over. It is the home of the original "Redan" par
three -- which at the time I thought was fairly unremarkable -- a hole which has
been copied more than any other in the world. My most memorable shot was the
approach at #13, "The Pit". I hit what I thought was a beautiful iron just over
the wall onto the green. When we got there it was down in the "pit" behind the
green and required a massive uphill putt. I think it took about four more
strokes to get it near the hole. Judy got her first par in Scotland on
#17!
 |
The next day we visited
St. Andrews.
Having played at North Berwick I was accustomed to the "public" nature of these
courses. People were perfectly free to walk across the fairway to and from the
beach. So this gave us the opportunity to walk parts of The Old Course. We
walked out a couple holes along the beach side, then came back along the famous
"Road Hole" (17) and along the road to the even more famous Swilcan Bridge over
the "burn" on 18. |
On Tuesay we played the local
course at Linlithgow as a guest of our host. This offered an interesting taste
of the other kind of course in Scotland -- an inland or parkland course -- more
like what we Canadians are used to, but a bit more rugged.
Then on
Wednesday we headed north to the town of Dornoch for what was to be perhaps the most
memorable part of our trip. Dornoch is a beautiful little town on the Dornoch
Firth about 30 miles north of Inverness. The town itself is historically
significant as one of the focal points for "the clearances" that took place in
the 1840s. This was when the 1st Duke of Sutherland sent the peasant farmers
packing and replaced them with sheep. It is also the site of the last witch
burning that took place in the Great Britan.
|
Royal Dornoch from the tee at #6
Judy plays out of a bunker on the Struie
Course |
The golf course at Royal Dornoch
is
one of the most famous in the world. Its isolation makes it even more appealing
for golf romantics like me. On Wednesday night we walked the course as darkness
settled in (at around 11pm).
Then on Thursday I played my first round on
the hallowed links. It was not one of my best rounds. I was a single sandwiched
between two foursomes, playing an unknown course.
Two ball
Barcelona had not yet been invented, and it is arguably against the rules to
play it in this situation anyway.
It was a memorable round nonetheless.
Even if the shots were not particularly good, and the golfer was confused and
somewhat at loose ends, the day was warm and pleasant, the course was strikingly
beautiful, and I had played one of the world's best courses.
Later that
day Judy and I played the Struie Course which is the 2nd course on the Dornoch
links. It was then under development and not particularly outstanding. On our
second visit in 2003 the Struie Course had been much improved and was well worth
playing. |
|
We found this phone booth on the back road along the
coast to Brora.
The gallery at Brora watch Judy tee
off. |
The next day we had the
opportunity to explore some of the local points of interest. A trip up the coast
to Dunrobin Castle at Golspie was well worth it. The falconry exhibition was
outstanding.
In the afternoon we played the golf course at Brora,
further up the coast another 15 miles or so. It was perfect Scottish golfing
weather. The gusty wind was blowing in off the Firth bringing short burst of
light rain punctuated by sunny breaks.
This was one of those rounds you
never forget. Brora is the only course I've played where neighbouring sheep and
cattle are free to roam the links and the greens are fenced off with electrical
wire. The course features lots of interesting shots over rugged grazing terrain.
A fairly decent round can easily be ruined by a miscalculation at 18. It's a
longish par 3 (190) with a huge catchment area in front of the elevated green
sitting right up beside the club house. I've been short every time I've played
it.
After a thoroughly enjoyable round we visited the dining room in the
club house for an early dinner. Then we headed back to Linlithgow to prepare for
the next leg of our trip -- our trip out past Loch Lomond and down the Kintyre
peninsula that juts out into the Irish
Sea.
|
In the next segment I will describe
our three day side trip to Campbeltown on the Mull of Kintyre where we had the
privilege of playing the world famous links at Macrahanish several
times.
This article and all photographs are copyright 2004 by Richard Hendershot,
and may not be reproduced without express written
permission.
----------------------
Rick Hendershot is an avid
golfer and student of the game, as well as a writer and internet publisher who
lives in Conestogo, Ontario, Canada. He publishes several golf related websites
and blogs, including Golf
Articles and Reviews, Very Special Golf Travel,
and The Weekend Golfer's
Blog. He also manages an advertising and link placement service called
The LinkNet Network. |
