Great short golf trips

[Ed Tilley]

You have a £300 / $500 budget excluding travel. 3 days golf, 2 nights accommodation. Suggestions please for great golf trips and why. For me, where you stay is almost as important as where you play - good restaurants / pubs are all part of a great trip. I'll start the ball rolling with one that I've done from each of England, Scotland, Wales, Ireland, and France.

North East France - Golf courses Le Touquet (Mer), Hardelot (1 round each of Dunes and Pins), Belle Dune. Stay in Montreuil-sur-Mer. Variety of golf: 2 links courses, 2 heathland courses - one old, one modern. Great food and wine and only 3 hours door to door from London.

South West England - Golf at St. Enodoc, Burnham & Berrow & Perranporth. Stay in Port Isaac. Beautiful part of the world, fantastic seafood. Great 'quirky' links courses.

South Wales - Golf at Pyle & Kenfig, Tenby & Pennard (although could substitute Royal Porthcawl or Southerndown for P&K within budget). Stay in Tenby - extremely lively holiday town. Eat at the Bay of Bengal Indian - if you can get a window seat overlooking the bay it is truly spectacular. Again, superb old fashioned links courses.

Scotland - Golf at Dornoch, Brora, and Golspie. Stay in Dornoch. Don't really need to say much about Dornoch - anyone spotting my bias towards old fashioned links?

West Ireland - Golf at Carne, Enniscrone, Connemara. Stay in Westport, another lively resort town. With a bit of travel Connemara could be substituted for County Sligo. I might have mentioned before that Enniscrone is fantastic and the other courses aren't too shabby either.

[Jfaspen]

The Gailes in Northern Michigan (playing The Gailes/Blackshire)
Then swinging over, hitting Forest Dunes, continuing and playing Arcadia Bluffs before finishing at Kingsley/Crystal.

[Bill_McBride]

Royal Porthcawl could bust the budget, it was 75 pounds in May 2004.  But worth it of course.  By contrast, Pennard was 20 pounds.  There's also a very nice hotel in Swansea near Pennard, but pricey.

[Brad Tufts]

Northern New England has many of these....I've done one to NH to Maplewood, Bethlehem CC, Mt. Washington, and the Balsams (all Ross, two 4s, one 6, one 8 ) and plan on trying to do one to Maine to Northeast Harbor, Kebo Valley, Samoset, Cape Arundel, and maybe a 9-holer or two.  Vermont can also be done with Rutland CC, Green Mountain National, and Neshobe GC being the most likely for me (all central VT, accessible by rtes. 7 and 4.  Eastern Mass would be tough b/c you would be paying close to $50/rd, but it can be done in Western Mass.

[ForkaB]

Ed

Great post, but you are tormenting the guys who live in the States.

If you live in Palo Alto, with $500 you can drive to Pebble Beach, play a round there, have a drink or two, but you can't get back!  No wonder they call it Hotel California.....

[Larry_Keltto]

Morgans Hotel in Swansea is fabulous, but yes, it would bust the budget.

[Tom Huckaby]

He is tormenting us a bit, yes.  

But could a visitor really do the Dornoch area trip for US$500?  It was well more than that, all told (all greens fees + hotel), when I went there in 2000... odds are it's quite more these days... Methinks there's fudging going on.

 

[Tony_Muldoon]

Lincolnshire. There are two courses at Woodall Spa (but you might choose to play one twice). The Hotchkiss is top 50 on most world listings and of course the bunkering is unforgettable.  They have a good hotel with a special rate for the golf. Is this the only world top fifty where you can play a round and have lunch for under 80 smackers?

30 mins away are the links at Seacroft.  You will have the place to yourself because seemingly the only visitors who have ever played it are Ran (see report), Donald Steel and I who all love it. Cost £45 max.  (Yes I'm ignoring a Mr T Doak but he's wrong on this one ok?)


(Q Which poster on here has an invitation to play Woodhall Spa this easter that he can't take up because he's taking his nearest and dearest in the opposite direction.  Life can be so cruel . No it's not me).

[Tony_Muldoon]

He is tormenting us a bit, yes.  

But could a visitor really do the Dornoch area trip for US$500?  
 

More torment Tom, I've a booking for 3 rounds at Dornoch this summer for only £75 a round and the other two are less. So I think you could do it and have a pint or two as well as long as you are careful about your lodgings.

[Tom Huckaby]

Tony:

The budget is 300 pounds.  So you found two nights of lodging plus the rounds at Brora and Golspie all for 75 pounds combined?  Well done... and enjoy your time in the tent.

 

[Craig Sweet]

The beauty, and the curse, of living in Montana is you can't get here (and I can't leave here) for 300 pounds.  

[Tom Huckaby]

The beauty, and the curse, of living in Montana is you can't get here (and I can't leave here) for 300 pounds.  

Another beauty, and curse, is that one of your main state schools just pulled off one hell of an upset and screwed up the NCAA pools of oh so many in this great land.

Well done Grizzlies.

Sorry, dammit some one had to mention SOMETHING about what's going on these days out in the real world!  Forgive me Mucci for I have sinned....

 

[Ed Tilley]

He is tormenting us a bit, yes.  

But could a visitor really do the Dornoch area trip for US$500?  
 

More torment Tom, I've a booking for 3 rounds at Dornoch this summer for only £75 a round and the other two are less. So I think you could do it and have a pint or two as well as long as you are careful about your lodgings.

To do it in budget you can only play Dornoch once. Also, at this price you wouldn't be able to stay at The Golf Hotel - The Eagle hotel is a LOT cheaper. If you have two sharing in a twin you could even afford 2 rounds at Dornoch within budget. But I suppose if you're coming all the way from the US to Dornoch you should play Dornoch as often as you can.

Tony - very keen to get to Woodhall Spa and Seacroft. So now that's 2006 Silloth..., 2007 Cornwall, 2008 Biarritz, 2009 Lincolnshire. Perhaps I'm planning a bit too far ahead!

[Tom Huckaby]

Ed - thank you for the reality check.  Yes, it could be done, with scrimping on golf and hotel, neither of which one really ought to do there as one really does live only once - thus I assumed no scrimping.