I wrote this a year or so ago for a blog I had, and it still reflects my thoughts.
Winter Golf in Scotland
October is the finest month, covering
warm but cooling turf with dying leaves
full of breezes that do not waft, but prevail;
descending into darkness, with shafts of light.
On my home course, the winter greens are appearing. They have been demarcated for several weeks now with lines of lime and even officious signs, but as the year grinds to an end, they are becoming more lifelike very day.
It will not be long that we will be playing "winter greens," patches of mown fairway to the front and side of our "regular" greens. So small (200 sq. ft. or so) that they can be hit only by the most accurate and creative shot, and yet so close to the tee that you think you should hit them all, even those still 450 yards away......
Fortunately, the days when we will be playing only winter greens will be few and far between. On an average day, only 3-5 of the regular greens will be out of play, due to early morning frost. On at least 1/3 of the winter days we will be able to play to all 18 of them. It will be a rare (but excitingly bracing) day when all winter greens will be in play.
My course is probably an "average" one for Scotland--on the water, but with "parkland" turf. Inland parkland courses will rarely see their regular greens from November to early March, whilst proper links courses will probably not even see the need for "winter" greens.
Regardless of the condition or set-up of the course, however, winter golf in Scotland is a pervasive and often magical thing. For the most avid golfers there are regular inter- and intra-club competitions. Where I play, in Fife, the Scratch Winter League runs from October to March, and is as competitive as team matches get throughout the year. At my club, the Winter-long 4-ball knockout is one of our most popular competitions. For less avid golfers, wintertime is chance to get out on the course for a brisk walk with your friends, or even yourself. For parents, it is a chance to get out with your children without fear of mindless reprobation.
The light in Scotland can be amazing in the late fall. In the deepest days of the winter, the sun hardly rises above the horizon before it is time to slide back into the West, leaving only traces of light pink and dark blue to let you know that there has been a day at all. In October and November, the pinks are pinker and the blues bluer, and they last longer than they will do in the months to come.
But, even in the darkest days, you can still golf, and golf well. On Christmas Eve you can golf in your shirtsleeves in Dornoch, at the latitude of Juneau and Moscow. In Fife, you can play 5 holes in a blinding snowstorm in February, go sledding with your children that afternoon (after a malt whisky or two in the clubhouse....), and then play the next day when the snow has melted. And then.......before you know it, it is March, and the snowdrops are come and gone and the daffodils are out in all their colour and turf is warming up, and it not long before the "true" golfing season is upon you again.
I, for one, always look forward to that day, but I will never ever regret that there has been a winter. In many ways, winter golf in Scotland is as good as it gets.