GOLF DESTINATIONS
positioned on a promontory above the sea, with a long carry to it over a deep gully of rough ground. You either had to take it on or play the hole as a 3-shotter. TEES RESERVED FOR MEMBERS Turnberry is associated in the minds of many as purely a resort, yet this is as much a members’ club as any in Scotland. As I discovered talking to the kilted starter before we teed off the next morning on Ailsa. Seeking his advice on which tees to play from, I pointed to the blue tees as a departure point. “Those are only for the use of the members, sir. You can choose between yellow and white.” Members having their own tees is unusual but speaks to the tradition of a club which took its initial steps in 1892, following a meeting of locals at the most famous lighthouse in golf, a landmark which gives Turnberry’s courses their unique status. It provides a sense of location and added character to the seaside holes furthest from the clubhouse. The lighthouse was built in 1873 by Thomas Stevenson – father of author Robert Louis Stevenson – and owes its survival to a Trump restoration which saw it converted into what is claimed to be the world’s most spectacular halfway house. It’s perfectly situated between the ninth green and tenth tee of the Ailsa Course. Upstairs is the most expensive suite at Turnberry, two bedrooms said to cost R80 000 a night! My room on the first floor of the hotel had a luxurious bathroom almost as large as the bedroom area, and lofty views over the course. The big-screen TV showed a fascinating black-and- white documentary of daily activities at the resort in the 1920s. In the evening, below my windows, a lone piper played for the guests sitting in the downstairs lounge as the light faded. THE AILSA’S FIVE PAR 3S Ebert’s changes on the Ailsa were effective yet minimal. Significantly a par 4 was lost and the number of 3s increased to five. You play four of them, each quite spectacularly imposing, in the remarkable stretch of eight holes along the coastline, No 4 to 11, which
gives Turnberry its special character. The old par-4 ninth in front of the lighthouse was converted into a 227-metre par 3 from a back tee perched on rocks above the sea. This allowed Ebert to turn No 10 into a long par 5 along the beach, with magnificent cross bunkers short of the green. The par-3 11th on the shoreline was redesigned, and this is a heavenly hole which better golfers need to experience from the black tee at 202 metres, a golf shot assured to up your heart rate. No 14 was lengthened to become a par 5, and No 17 shortened slightly to a 465-metre par 4, although it’s a similar distance to when Nick Price played it as a 5 in the 1994 Open and made his famous last-round eagle. The round thus concludes with a daunting triumvirate of three of the most challenging 4s on the Ailsa. The back tee at 18 (444m) is now so far back you’re looking down on the beach, and a phalanx of bunkers guards both sides of a narrow fairway. The total length was extended to 6 860 metres, par 71. Duel in the Sun is the name of the upstairs 19th hole in the clubhouse, commemorating that epic clash between Tom Watson and Jack Nicklaus in the 1977 Open, and it’s a comfortable
space with the grandest of views to enjoy lunch after a round, or drinks later in the day. We relaxed there to talk about our morning round before embarking on our wind-down round at the 9-hole Arran. It’s free for those golfers who have played one of the “big” courses, and a relaxing conclusion to one of the most memorable 24 hours of my golfing life.
92 GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA
SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2024
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