Royal County Down Championship Links Review

George Baillie, a Scottish schoolteacher, laid out the first nine holes at Newcastle in 1889, and Old Tom Morris was paid four guineas to stretch them to eighteen by 1890. Harry Vardon reworked the links in 1908, the year the club received its royal title, and Harry Colt reduced the blind drives and softened the gathering greens in 1926. What survives is a links of rare natural drama, set between Dundrum Bay and the Mountains of Mourne, with Slieve Donard rising over the town.

The front nine is among the finest in golf. The 4th is a long par three played across gorse and bunkers toward the mountains, and the 9th, a long par four, is driven from a high tee straight at Slieve Donard onto a fairway far below, one of the most photographed views in the game. The course is eccentric as well as great. Several drives are still blind, the bunkers are fringed with coarse grass that gathers a ball rather than rejecting it, and the small greens hide wicked borrows. The rankings forgive the quirks: Golf Digest placed it first in the world in 2024, and a Top 100 Golf Courses survey named it the most scenic course in Britain and Ireland.

It has never staged an Open, but it has held the Walker Cup and the Irish Open, most recently in 2024, and the wind off the Irish Sea makes it as severe as any championship venue.

Visitors are welcome and book through the club, which quotes the rate at booking, and a caddie costs a further 75 pounds, money well spent on a course with this many blind lines. Access is rationed and the fee sits at the premium end of links golf, which is what the value grade reflects.