The Golf Courses of the British IslesDarwin, Bernard
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The Golf Courses of the British Isles
Darwin, Bernard
Golf courses -- Great Britain
The fifth, again, has a fine tee-shot over a big bunker, which should
see us safely at the bottom of another gorge between the hills, with a
good second shot to follow. Then follow some of the newer holes amid
a broken country of smaller undulations, and then we come back to the
club-house again for the ninth. The tenth has a very interesting
and difficult second on to a green that lies in a little nook or angle
guarded by a turf wall; and the twelfth is a short hole that may be
deserving of criticism, but appeals to the affections of many. Need
I add that the shot is a blind one, but it is a fascinating pitch,
nevertheless, into a crater green with its concomitant admixture of
hopes and fears. After this the golf, though good, is for a while less
attractive. The land is flatter, and though the holes are long, there
is just that depressing suggestion of an agricultural character such as
we have in some of the holes beyond the wall at Prestwick. The course
ends splendidly, however, with a really fine hole, its green narrow,
well guarded, and difficult to stay upon. The turf throughout is a joy
alike to walk or play on, and altogether Portmarnock is a place to
leave with a very genuine regret, even in a snowstorm.
On leaving Dublin we may betake ourselves southward to the very
charming course of =Lahinch= in County Clare, where, if the holes are
rather unduly blind and put a great premium on local knowledge, the
golf is yet intensely enjoyable. The greatest compliment I have heard
paid to Lahinch came from a very fine amateur golfer, who told me that
it might not be the best golf in the world, but was the golf he liked
best to play. Lest this may be attributed to patriotic prejudice, I may
add that he was an Englishman born and bred. Delightful though Lahinch
is, however, it is rather to the north that we must go to get a variety
of good courses. In Donegal there is Buncrana, on Lough Swilly, a
really good nine-hole course which has nurtured the best player than
has yet come out of Ireland, Mr. Lionel Munn: there is also Rosapenna,
and there is Portsalon, which lies at the far end of the lough, a truly
lovely spot, with a thoroughly entertaining golf course. I must put in
one word for the quaintest and most charming little nine-hole course
at Macamish, also on the shores of Lough Swilly, which can be reached
by sailing across from Buncrana or by driving from anywhere else an
interminable number of Irish miles over a rocky make-shift of a road.
It is the most purely amateur course in the world, and also, if more
than two or three are gathered together upon it, the most perilous.
The holes cross and recross each other and everybody aims at his own
particular hole in a light-hearted, pic-nicking frame of mind, and
perfectly regardless of the lives of others. For pure, unadulterated
fun I have yet to see the equal of this course.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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