What will 2021 bring?

So, the last few months have been pretty tedious. I completed my recap of 2020 in January and have been thinking about what might be possible in 2021. Planning golf trips is one of my favourite pastimes. Putting the plans in to practice is, however, more complicated. The complications arise from various factors – mainly balancing time, work and family. There is, of course, a further complication at the moment with restrictions on travel and limited access to some courses. That said, things are finally starting to look a bit more positive.

Given the experience of 2020, I have scaled back some of my more adventurous plans. The focus would be on the UK and Ireland for 2021. This is certainly no hardship, as there are 30 of the World Top 100 courses located remarkably close to home. With 5 courses already ticked off, I now have 95 to conquer in just over 10 years. So, I need to work out how to secure roughly 10 per year.

I also achieved fewer of the England Top 100 courses than I had expected, but am doing pretty well, with 43 completed. The aim here was to finish the list by the end of 2025.

Goals

So, with that in mind, let’s start by setting some goals and then we can have a look at how we might achieve them. This has been revised a few times, with trips to Ireland (planned for June) and The Belfry (planned for April) already cancelled.

Goal 1: 10 more from the World Top 100
– Muirfield, North Berwick, Sunningdale (Old), Machrihanish (Old), Royal Birkdale, Woodhall Spa, Royal Troon, Prestwick, St. George’s Hill and Sunningdale (New).

Plans for a grand trip to East Lothian (see below) have now been finalised and (at this point) it is looking very hopeful that we will actually get there. In addition, it looks like we will be spending some time in Scotland in August. My wife and I have booked to return to Arran (with a week on Islay first), which I hope will give me an opportunity to hop across to Campeltown to do Machrihanish. We have subsequently been invited to join a trip with another part of the family to Ayrshire. Hopefully that will unlock Troon and Prestwick.

Goal 2: 17 more from the England Top 100
– Woodhall Spa, Hindhead, Liphook, Ganton, North Hants, Royal Ashdown Forest, Notts (Hollinwell), Sherwood Forest, Crowborough Beacon, Wallasey, Camberley Heath, Worplesdon, Moor Park (High), Thorndon Park, Coombe Hill, The Belfry (Brabazon) and London Club (Heritage)

The most ambitious goal for the year will be to get across to the US. Chris and I had a trip planned to Florida last May, which obviously didn’t happen. We have re-booked for September … that would add TPC Sawgrass, Bay Hill and Merion to the agenda.

A Return To Golf

The success with the vaccination programme and associated falling numbers allowed the Prime Minister to release his roadmap in February. All has gone well so far and steps 1 & 2 have been successfully navigated. The golf courses re-opened on 29 March and out-door catering facilities followed on 12 April. I have managed a couple of trips to The Grove, a round at Princes and three competitions at Hadley Wood. As you will know from previous posts, The Grove and Princes both offer high quality golf that is accessible to non-members. This has proved particularly good for being able to play with friends who do not have a home course (or indeed whilst my home club has been members only).

The next couple of weeks are lined up with some more excellent courses. In particular, I am looking forward to what will be an absolute treat on Tuesday. A return to Woburn’s Duchess course for an early morning round with DTH and then travelling from there to Sunningdale. I have played both of the courses at Sunningdale before, but not as part of the challenge. This will be my first Top 100 course ticked off for the year as I take on the Old Course with Jonny, Chris and Jeffers.

The following week I return to Woking for the LSGS Spring Meeting. A trip to Woking is always a treat.

In any event, it will be a great warm-up for the bigger trips to come … Reports and reviews on those to follow!

East Lothian

It is my 40th birthday in April and I have been making plans for this for several years. The initial plan had been to try and organise a group trip to Pebble Beach. While this looked good on paper, in practice it was not easy. In particular, the majority of trips advertised by YourGolfTravel or Golf Breaks are for 5 nights and 3 rounds. Fine, but that is a long way to go for a such a short period. Anyway, the global pandemic quickly rendered that idea unworkable.

So, I started looking at options a little closer to home. As I have mentioned in earlier posts, I am a big fan of No Laying Up. If you have not seen season 2 of Tourist Sauce, I would thoroughly recommend it. This is essentially a lads golf trip to Scotland taking in East Lothian, St. Andrew’s and into the Highlands. It is an amazing advert both for well-known courses (Royal Dornoch, North Berwick and the Old Course) but more particularly for those lesser known (Kilspindie, Cullen and Brora).

If that was not sufficient inspiration, the Cookie Jar team have released a film of their trip to Scotland a little earlier this year. Both parts are great, but Part II takes in East Lothian and is well worth watching.

Itinerary

In the footsteps of my heroes, I have secured rooms at The Ducks Inn. This was almost as important as getting the tee times, so I am delighted to have sorted that out. If you do not know The Ducks Inn, I implore you to watch Episode 1 of Tourist Sauce Season 2.

The golf is based around the two World Top 100 courses of Muirfield and North Berwick. Getting a tee time at the latter is rather easier than the former. At Muirfield there are very specific visitor tee times on Tuesdays and Thursday. You can also get tee times on some Fridays if you stay at the Greywalls Hotel, but I understand that these tee times do not come with the dining options that you get on the standard days. Anyway, I have managed to secure a Thursday tee time.

As the tee time on Thursday is relatively early, it was decided that we should travel up on Wednesday. It therefore seemed silly not to fit in an extra round on Wednesday afternoon. Then the question was to work out how much golf everyone was happy to play.

I am fortunate to have a decent golfing network and from quizzing a few people, I was pointed in the direction of Dunbar. While most people focus on the courses between Musselburgh and North Berwick, I am told that it is worth going a little further round the coast. We start with a twilight round of 18 holes on the Wednesday afternoon.

Muirfield and North Berwick

After our Wednesday warm-up we head to Muirfield and will play our own ball in the morning. Lunch is included as part of the package and then there is the option to play again in the afternoon. The play after lunch is alternate shot (foursomes), which could be entertaining after sampling the no-doubt excellent wine list!

At number 12 in the list, this will be the highest ranked course so far. It is as unusual layout which does not follow the traditional “out-and-back” links routing. It is arranged as two loops of 9 holes – one clockwise and one anti-clockwise. Consequently each hole has the wind blowing in a different direction. The course has hosted The Open 16 times, but was removed from the roster in 2016 after a vote not to allow women to become members.

We then travel to North Berwick to play the West Links on Friday. I decided that after what will no doubt be a highly exciting day on the Thursday, we should just play 18 holes on Friday. So, we have a the time in the middle of the day to give us time for a relaxing morning and an early lunch. The sign at the entrance states “Your Green Fee ticket entitles you to temporary membership of The North Berwick Golf Club where you will be made to feel welcome by the members”. I have heard that this is true!

Gullane and Kilspindie

After what should be a very enjoyable day on Friday, we will head into Gullane to take on Course No. 2 in the morning and Course No. 3 in the afternoon. The No. 1 Course often takes the plaudits, but the inside information suggests that there is not much to choose between 1 and 2. The first seven holes run alongside those on Course No. 1 and its 6,385 yards indicate it will be no pushover.

The website description of No. 3 states “Of all courses at Gullane, No. 3 enjoys some of the best views across Aberlady Bay to Edinburgh and the Firth of Forth beyond.” Sounds like an ideal way to end the day! At a modest yardage of 5,134 yards the course rewards straight hitting and shot-making rather than brute strength.

We will finish up at Kilspindie on Sunday morning. This is a traditional Scottish links in the quaint town of Aberlady. The beach is in play on a number of holes and the views across Aberlady Bay and the Firth of Forth are said to be stunning. It is another relatively short course at a little under 5,500 yards from the white tees.