Wales Golf - 2019 (This was our golf trip last year, son Ian and myself) - by Mike Peck
Ian and I rented a car in London and headed to Wales for some great links golf. I've been wanting to play in Wales for 3 decades.
Our golf trip to Wales was a wonderful experience. Wales is an almost unknown golf destination to play great links courses. In 6 days we saw no tourists, yet the 1st Tee at Royal Porthcawl GC is only a 2:35 drive from London's Heathrow Airport. We stayed in South Wales and played Ashburnham, Penard, Southerndown, Pyle & Kenfig and Royal Porthcawl (saved the best till last but all were great). The top 5 links courses that were recommended to me by a Welsh pro. Temps 70-73 every day.
The assistant pro was giving Ian some tips before our game - John Daly was there the week before, played 18 with the members, the pro there was John's club maker for many years.
Ian's new swing is developing lots of power - he's 30-40 yards past me now on his drive - (now, 2020, he's hitting his 7 iron 190, 5 iron 210..it's insane...
Incredible views from all of our Wales courses, this from Pennard
Ashburnam was our first links course
Pennard was our next links - fabulous links!!
Everyone was so friendly in Wales. At Pyle & Kenfig the pro came out to our car in the car park and gave us two free club logo golf balls and welcomed us to the course. In the week we were in Wales we saw no Americans and not even any tourists at all! Great links courses, but not the tourist traffic like Scotland and Ireland. Hope to go back and play in NW Wales.
At the Pyle & Kenfig Dormy House for 3 nights - Day One, we did not know how huge their breakfasts were - the cappuccino machine was in the next room and available!!
At Southerndown GC, all 18 greens were encircled by electric fences to keep animals off so we had to do a lot of hopping. Great course!!
Our last course was the famed Royal Porthcawl - Great links which one day will hold The Open. We purposely planned our trip to play this last. We stopped into the pro-shop the evening before our round. The pro looked us up in his computer and told us we were all set up for 9 am the following morning but he said they were not busy and that if we wanted to go off earlier we could. He and all of the staff were very friendly. Even having our names posted the day we golfed.
The 'civilized' deck of the spike bar at Royal Porthcawl — I was afraid to sit in it!
You can take the beach walk-way from Royal Porthcawl into the town of Porthcawl, just a 10 min walk.
Royal Porthcawl
Our tariff to play Royal Porthcawl included a two course lunch in their dining room overlooking the course.
On our way back to London we stayed a night in The Cotswold's and hiked The Cotswold's Way. It was as peaceful as it can get. We thoroughly enjoyed this as an addition to our golf trip.
We stayed in Winchcombe, which is set in the heart of the beautiful Cotswold's. The Cotswold Way is a 102-mile long-distance footpath, running along the Cotswold Edge escarpment of the Cotswold Hills in England.
We hiked a 7.3 mile path that took us to an ancient burial ground called Belas Knap, a tomb dating from about 3800 BC.
Cheers!
Mike & Ian
The Elie Golf Links, just south of St. Andrews, Scotland
Elie Golf Links is a very reputable links course which we have played many times over the years. Here is some information about the starter's periscope and a few pics I took of my daughter looking through the scope.
Stater’s Office at Elie Links
The sight of a submarine periscope towering almost 32 feet above the starter’s hut at Elie Golf Links was one of the more unusual spectacles in world golf. At the end of April 2014 the periscope took up its new home in the newly built Starters’ Office.
The periscope was salvaged from HMS Excalibur in 1966 and was presented to the club by member Gavin Reekie.
It gives the starter a perfect view over the hill at the first hole and having made sure the group in front are well on their way, he can then safely invite golfers on the tee to ‘play away.’
Visitors and members alike are encouraged to take a look through the periscope and appreciate the unrivalled 360 degree view it provides.
Indeed, taking a moment to enjoy this memorable experience is all part of a round of golf at Elie. You will not be the first to imagine what it must have been like for the submarine’s captain to peer out from under the waves while HMS Excalibur was still in service.
Both the views north into the Fife countryside and south over the Firth of Forth are a real delight and the canny golfer will also take a moment to see just where the hole on the second green has been cut for the day!
HMS Excalibur and its sister ship HMS Explorer, were the only submarines powered by high test peroxide that the Royal Navy ever built. They were launched in the mid 1950s, but by the end of 1968 both had been scrapped.
It is perhaps fitting that the periscope from such an experimental vessel as HMS Excalibur has ended up in such an unusual resting place. To this day it remains a unique and much loved feature of golf at Elie.