A postcard from Gullane No. 2 and Lundin Golf Club
So we don’t get chosen in the lottery to play the Old Course. After two great days, we’re fine with that.
In planning our trip, Jason and I agreed to leave two open days, Tuesday and Wednesday, to enter the lottery to play the Old Course at St. Andrews. We had walked the course on a Sunday six years ago, and this would be our chance to play the most iconic venue in golf.
The thinking was that we would know 48 hours in advance for each day, so would have time to book tee times elsewhere. After some research and hunting, our fall-back courses were Gullane No. 2, just 15 miles or so from our first night’s lodging in North Berwick (No. 12 Inn & Bistro, cool place) and Lundin Golf Club, a short drive from our second and third-night Air BnB in St. Andrews.
And yes, that’s just a five-minute walk, with clubs on our back, from the Old Course, but we’re over that now. Mostly.
The Gullane Golf Club, founded in 1882, offers three 18-hole courses. Gullane No. 1 is world-renowned, host of Scottish Opens and other big events, including qualifying for the Open Championship when it is held at nearby Muirfield, and the little community of Gullane is as golf-centric as can be, such a great vibe of old stone buildings and houses and bustling center, as is North Berwick.
In writing about Gullane No. 1 30 years ago, the late James W. Finegan described its many virtues and challenges and great views of Aberlady Bay as the perfect place to introduce someone to seaside golf. And he urged his readers to also play No. 2 (as well as No. 3), describing them as “somewhat less testing and routed over the same magnificent terrain, also grand.”
Well, in journalistic terms, Finegan buried the lede, because we found No. 2 to be wonderful, challenging but not aggressively penal, “golf with a twist in its tail” as the course guide puts it, with humpy fairways and grand views. It is also legitimately old, laid out by Willie Park Jr. in 1898, and a great deal at 95 British pounds ($126) vs. 260 pounds ($345) at No. 1.
Playing as a two-some, on a sunny and almost windless day, it was as perfect a day of golf ever.
Jason, who came within a foot or two of an ace on the par 3 No. 5 hole (171 yards) posted an 85 from the yellow tees (6,015 yards), while I went 50-44-94 from the reds at 5,566 yards.
After our round, Jason drove us the two hours to St. Andrews (“left side, left side”) where we would wake up Wednesday morning to play Lundin Golf Club, established in 1868 on Largo Bay.
Wrote Finegan: “All things considered, Lundin may well be among the half-dozen most spirited courses in Scotland. There is a lot going on. …” He went on to describe the wind, the more than 100 bunkers, the multiple blind and semi-blind shots, the burns that snake through several holes, the out-of-bounds, etc.
As I read that description to Jason he said plaintively “that sounds hard.” Yes, but also fun for this two-some on a day that started chilly and foggy and turned into more sunshine. From the yellow tees (6,138 yards) Jason shot 43-44-87 with two birdies and four pars. From the green tees (5,671) I went 49-48-97. At 115 British pounds ($150), we weren’t disappointed.
In fact, before the afternoon is over, we’ll walk from our Air BnB back to the Old Course, to watch golfers finish on No. 18 and think, to quote Jim Harbaugh, “who has it better than us? Nobody!”
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