You might legitimately ask what Portmarnock is doing on an Open Championship Venues, Golf Vacation? The reason(s) are simple

At some point we have to play Royal Portrush. If we use Dublin as our port of arrival, we can reduce the number of domestic flights we need to make to one

Flights to Dublin are usually less expensive than those to London or Edinburgh

Finally, we’re also trying to future proof the integrity of the structure. There are credible rumours that the R&A is seeking to add Portmarnock to the rotation. We think this one has legs and will run.

Portrush has been incredibly successful commercially for the R&A. Portmarnock, on the outskirts of Dublin, would be Portrush on steroids

We lose nothing by starting in Dublin either. The city is charismatic and buzzy and we’ll likely welcome a day to draw breath before we launch into this

World top-75 ranked

With a rich history closely aligned to the progression of golf in Ireland, Portmarnock has hosted numerous Irish Open Championships, the Walker Cup, Irish Amateur Championships and the British Amateur Championship, and the rumour that it’s being lined up as the next course to be introduced to the Open rotation doesn’t look like dying down.

From Sam Snead to Seve Ballesteros, some of golf’s best-known names have tested their skills against this majestic narrow tongue of shallow dunes-land, just north of Dublin.

Considered by many as one of the fairest links courses in the world it delivers an incredible challenge and true test of golf.

Perhaps five-time Open Championship winner Tom Watson summed up the links best during his visits saying, “There are no tricks or nasty surprises, only an honest, albeit searching test of shot making skills.”

World top-25 ranked & Open Championship venue

Royal Portrush is constructed on an area of natural dune land framed by limestone cliffs. The Open was held here in 1951, and won by Max Faulkner. In 2019 it returned, Shane Lowry playing the elements best of all to prove a popular local(ish) winner, whilst Scottie Scheffler obliged in 2025 (note how quickly the R&A came back!)

The Dunluce Links is home to one of the most stunning par fours in golf, the 411 yard 5th hole. A dogleg hole played from an elevated tee towards the ocean, it rewards the daring shot across a wide expanse of rough. An overly long approach shot will end up on the sand of the White Rocks beach which lies just beyond the rear of the green however. Carnage!

Calamity Corner, the 210 yard par 3 16th hole is the other feature hole. Between the tee and the green is a yawning chasm, which must be cleared to stand any chance of making your three. This is a score wrecker coming at a decisive moment in the round.

Open Championship venue

Hoylake first hosted in 1897, but was dropped in 1967 having hosted a total of 10 Opens. It was re-introduced in 2006, when Tiger Woods memorably won an emotional event. In 2014 Rory McIlroy followed him for his solitary title, and in 2023 it was turn of Brian Harman to lift the claret jug as he fired a 65 in the second round that opened up a decisive gap that he defended without event.

Hoylake is normally regarded as the least striking of the Open venues, its first six holes being pancake flat. It’s a course you rarely ‘get’ first time as its challenge is in adjusting your stand for the subtle undulations that can otherwise find us chopping down if we aren’t concentrating fully.

For the 2023 championship a controversial par 3 was introduced which certainly caught the eye, but probably looked a little bit too much like the manufactured transplant that it was.

World top-100 ranked and Open Championship venue

Royal Birkdale first hosted in 1954 but has made up for lost time since. Set amongst towering dunes that look as if they belong in Ireland, Birkdale is widely held to be England’s ‘best’ links course

The distinctive art deco clubhouse overlooking the 18th is arguably the courses signature, but that would be to do disservice to the 6th and 13th holes

It remains the only English venue where Tom Watson triumphed and  hosted in 2017 when Jordan Spieth having got himself into an almighty mess at the 13th had the presence of mind to exploit a line of sight ruling to limit the damage to just a bogey before coming home with a ‘wet sail’ to beat Matt Kuchar

Along with Lytham and Muirfield, it is one of just three venues to have hosted the Open, Ryder and Walker Cups, the Ryder Cup memorably in 1969 in what became known as ‘the concession’.

“I don’t think you would have missed it, but I wasn’t going to give you the chance, either.” – Jack Nicklaus

World top-100 ranked and Open Championship venue

Royal Lytham is a strange course aesthetically, being surrounded by houses. It’s the one links that hosts the open where you don’t get views of the sea. It also has the unusual quirk of opening with a par 3

The course first hosted in 1926 and has done the honours a total of 11 times now.

A few years ago Faraway Fairways got a database of every score posted on every hole for every round at their most recent Open Championship. We then conducted an adjustment for prevailing conditions, based on a allowance system borrowed from horse racing. So what was the most difficult course on the Open rotation? To our surprise, it was actually Lytham. A closer inspection of the scoring suggests that two of its brutal part 5’s allied with the most bunkers on the rotation was the reason.

The course is probably most associated with two European names however. Seve Ballesteros is a two time winner here, memorably in 1979 when he drove into the overflow car park (his shot, not his vehicle) and had a car moved to allow him to play without penalty

Tony Jacklin won here in 1969 to record an incredibly rare hoe victory

At a shade over 200 miles, and an estimated 4.5 hrs road time, the drive between Blackpool and Troon is the longest single push we’ll undertake.

We’ve scheduled this as a break day, but it needn’t be completely necessary to treat it as such? If we wanted to, we could theoretically play Turnberry on Saturday afternoon, Prestwick on Sunday afternoon, and pick Troon up on Monday morning as planned? Prestwick is the home of the original Open Championship from 1860, so the integrity of the Open Championship Venues, Golf Vacation would be maintained

Would we want to accept nine consecutive days of golf however? or would we prefer to ‘take our time’ and leave Blackpool when we feel ready to do so?

World top-25 ranked & Open Championship venue

The iconic Stevenson lighthouse sitting on its craggy headland in amongst the ruins of Turnberry castle, and with views of Ailsa Craig and the Isle of Arran out to sea, plus a tendency to put on spectacular sunsets, Turnberry is the most aesthetic of all the Open venues. In modern golfing legend Turnberry is forever etched in the pages of history as the location for the ‘duel in the sun’ from 1977 when Tom Watson narrowly prevailed over Jack Nicklaus with the rest nowhere. Myths are made in moments, but legends last a lifetime.

In 2016 the course finished it’s stunning redevelopment. The new holes 9-11, look set to become the signature stretch. Not so much Amen Corner, as perhaps a Rocky Horror! The fifth is the hardest on the course and has been toughened up further. The fourteenth, an infinity hole out to sea might become the most awe inspiring.

Is Turnberry the best course in Scotland? We don’t know, it’s a hotly contested accolade, but it’s certainly in any conversation

Sometimes World top-100 ranked, & Open Championship venue

Troon is a traditional links and has hosted the Open a total of ten times. Make your score going out. The inward nine against the omni-present wind is always a trial, made harder by hideously deep rough interspersed with thick gorse and broom.

The par 3, eighth, described by Willie Park as “a pitching surface skimmed down to the size of a Postage Stamp” is the signature hole. The name stuck, and today it’s one the most recognisable short holes in the global game

It’s the par 4, eleventh, ‘the Railway Hole’, that’s the most feared though. In 1997 Tiger Woods carded an eight here. Jack Nicklaus was even more chewed up. He returned a ten in 1962. You have to wonder if there is a hole anywhere in world golf where Jack and Tiger have each signed for quadruples?

More recently Troon staged the memorable 2016 Championship. Henrik Stenson edged Phil Mickelson in one of the most stunning displays of head-to-head play in Major Championship history. They pulled a remarkable 11 shots clear, both shooting record equalling 63’s en-route.

World top-10 ranked and Open Championship venue

Frequently ranked inside the world’s top 10, Muirfield is the ‘blue-blooded’ aristocrat of Scottish golf and always immaculately presented. It doesn’t really have any weak holes. So impressed was Jack, he went back to Ohio and built Muirfield Village in homage to the original.

Muirfield instigated a then revolutionary design of two loops of nine. This was to prevent players dialling into the wind of the traditional out and back nine and adjusting.  This design ensures that the wind is constantly changing direction so as to test all aspects of your game and reading of a ball in flight. All three paradigms of golf design penal, heroic and strategic.

The prestigious roll call of Muirfield Open championship winners is perhaps its best testimonial. Player, Nicklaus, Trevino, Watson, Faldo, Els & most recently of course, Mickelson. It offers golfers choices and then requires you to execute. It is a golfers, golf course.

Muirfield is notoriously exclusive however, access is limited. Booking early isn’t just advised, it’s pretty well essential.

We’ve scheduled another break day for the Scottish capital, as we need to start thinking about freeing up space to launch our St Andrews Old Course campaign, for once we finish at Muirfield we head over to Fife

Edinburgh is a perfectly good place to dedicate the best part of a day to, and provided we can get into St Andrews for about 16.30 on Wednesday afternoon, we’ll also be able to enter the singles ballot for play on Thursday

It would be remiss however not to perhaps note that if we wanted to keep the treadmill of golf rolling, then the scope to play the world top-50 ranked course, and final Open Championship venue of North Berwick exists. It’s only 5 miles from Muirfield. Indeed, we could also play the surviving 9 hole Old Course at Musselburgh, which hosted the event six times, last doing so in 1889

World top-75 ranked

There are records of golf being played at Kingsbarns from 1793, but the modern course opened in 2000, and is set on three-tiered levels, sloping towards the coast. Nearly every hole has stunning views of the North Sea.

Kingsbarns  quickly racked up rave reviews and earned a world ranking of about #50, a position which it’s held more or less since.

The par 5, twelfth hole that plays along the arching shoreline to an exposed green, and the par 3, fifteenth, which involves playing a tee-shot across the waves, are often considered to the courses signature assignments. It was the fourth and fifth that caught Tom Doak’s eye when he described as Kingsbarns

“as piece of construction work, Kingsbarns is one of the best projects I’ve ever seen. I wouldn’t have believed it, if I hadn’t seen it for myself”

Perhaps of greatest significance is the number of times it beats more illustrious neighbours in surveys amongst visiting Americans since its always immaculately presented.

Kingsbarns completes the trio of East Coast giants that host the European Tour’s Dunhill links challenge each year alongside Carnoustie and the Old Course.

The Jubilee in question was that of Queen Victoria. This course therefore dates to 1897. It’s a quite typical links for the area, threading its way through low dunes, and without any double greens. The raised tees afford the golfer stunning views across St Andrews Bay and the town beyond.

It was only in 1988 that the Jubilee course came of age when Donald Steel was asked to upgrade it, adding length, interest, and challenge to the layout. Slowly it started to build up a reputation and loyalty. Today most judges agree the Jubilee is St Andrews’s most underrated course. Some go even further and regard it has the toughest links in the family now.

World top-10 ranked & Open Championship venue

The precise identity of the St Andrews Course we play will depend on the outcome of the ‘open’ ballots and the singles ballots (no one is going to sell a ‘guaranteed’ package for such a short duration)

With all the usual disclaimers of a lottery being random, and there being no such thing as a certainty etc plus the variable factor of availability for the specific week chosen, We should be able to contest a total of four open ballots (Weds, Thurs, Fri & Sat) and three ‘singles’ ballot (Thurs, Fri & Sat), for a total of seven. This should leave us with quite a good chance of success considering that the duration of this trip prevents us laying siege to the Old Course and adopting the sort of strategy that might otherwise be needed

If we fail, then we’ll look to use the St Andrews New Course as compensation under the present-pay-and-play-on-the-day protocol that exists

World top-50 ranked & Open Championship venue

Dubbed ‘Car-Nasty’, Carnoustie is considered by many to be the most difficult links in the Open Championship rotation

In recent years it has seen some dramatic finishes, none more so than in 1999 when Jean van de Velde took an eight at the 72^nd hole to throw away the claret jug. Iconic images of him paddling in the notorious ‘Barry Burn’ have entered golfing legend. The final four holes are the hardest finish on the rotation. After the carnage of 1999 (6 over won) Sport Illustrated described it as

“a nasty antique that was brought down from the attic after 24 years …the rough was deeper; and the R&A made the fairways as narrow as an eel’s appendix scar”.

Whereas the eighteenth is the hole that has often generated the most drama. The par 3 sixteenth has the highest average scoring par 3 on the Open Championship rotation as indeed the closing four are the hardest.  The Par 5, sixth ‘Hogan’s Alley’, is another famous hole with a punitive out of bounds fence running down it’s left

1999 Carnoustie reduced Sergio Garcia to tears after successive scores of 89 and 83

We can abandon any hire vehicle today and switch to the ‘iron horse’

We could fly from Edinburgh to London, but this will involve landing at Heathrow and then having to transfer to our hotel at St Pancras.

It’s actually going to be quicker (door to door) and a lot less aggro to use the train from Dundee to London’s Kings Cross station

If we wanted to add a bit of romance to the trip, it would be possible to drive to Edinburgh too and catch the famous ‘Flying Scotsman’ which traditionally at least were the simultaneous 10.00 departures from Edinburgh Waverley and London Kings Cross

Be sure to use 1st class though. Long distance train journeys in standard class can be quite grim

World top-100 ranked & Open Championship venue

Located on the Kent coast, south-east of London, Royal St Georges is the second geographic outlier on Open Championship Venues, Golf Vacation

Royal St Georges was the first English course to host the Open in 1894, and has subsequently gone onto do so 14 times, hosting again in 2021 when Colin Morikawa rode the crest of a wave.

It’s list of previous winners is probably one of the weaker ones though. It has thrown up surprises such as Ben Curtis, Bill Rogers, and Darren Clarke. This might be a testimony to the capricious fairways. Royal St Georges undulates more than any other venue and can spit a good tee shot into strange positions. Golf was never meant to be fair, or designed to make us look clever!

The signature hole is the fourth, famed for the giant ‘Coffin bunker’ that sits on your eyeline from the tee and would require that you launch an escape shot in the general direction of the International Space Station to extricate yourself