A Week in the South of England
Day 0 – Depart for London
Fly overnight from home to Heathrow Airport in London, where you’ll be welcomed the next morning.
Day 1 – Arrival & Burnham & Berrow
8:20am Arrival at Heathrow
1:30pm Tee time at Burnham & Berrow
Welcome to the UK!
This morning you’ll land at Heathrow and be met by a private car to welcome you. The nature of this trip is that it starts and ends with bigger driving days, but the travel on the days in between is pleasantly light.
You’ll first drive to Burnham & Berrow Golf Club – about a 2hr30 drive from the airport and a great first round – for a 1:30pm tee time.
After your opening 18, you’ll have a 1hr45 drive, into the region of Cornwall, to get to your hotel for the first two nights of the trip, Saunton Sands.
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Burnham & Berrow Golf Club
Telephone: +44 (0)1278 785760
Burnham & Berrow Golf Club was founded in 1890 and soon after, they hired a youngster called J.H. Taylor. His task was to be the club’s first professional and keeper of the greens. One of the great triumvirate, Taylor went on to win the Open Championship five times. It is unclear who originally designed the links. There is a church in the middle of the course and that in itself is unusual. Consequently over the years, changes have been made to the layout ensure that the faithful congregation does not get injured by wayward shots; additionally, some of the blind drives have been designed out.
There are many notable and varied holes at Burnham, with a strong collection of par threes. The first six holes are especially good and the back nine is magnificent. Burnham closes with a classic 18th, one of the best finishing holes in golf, a dogleg left over dunes and an intimidating long second shot across another ridge of dunes towards a green protected by deep threatening pot-bunkers.
Eighteen quality Links holes, set among the towering sand dunes on the Bristol Channel Coast, Burnham and Berrow has for over a century been the venue for many prestigious golfing events, from the British Ladies Amateur Championships, the Brabazon, the Tillman Trophy, the British Boys and English Championships. From the 1st Tee shot you know you are somewhere special! The Course is laid out in the traditional manner with nine holes out and nine back. The first nine holes skirt the sand dunes and coastline northwards, turning inland and southwards and then following the coast road through Berrow, past the Church and back into Burnham.
Course Fast Facts:
Yards: 6,988
Year Founded: 1890
Designer(s): Charles Gibson, J.H. Taylor
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Your Hotel:
Saunton Sands
Telephone: +44 (0)1271 890212
Saunton Sands is a flagship of Brend Hotels, 2015 winner of the Best Hotel Group in the U’. As a family run hotel for decades, the staff know how to provide you with a gorgeous, bespoke experience that rivals anything you’ll find anywhere in the world.
This fabulous four star art deco hotel sits in a world class location, on a cliff overlooking three miles of the best beach in the UK. Loved by surfers and longboarders for the clean consistent waves, families for beachy fun, and walkers for the vast expanse of wild and wonderful dunes and its position right on the South West Coast Path, this is a very special place. It’s not all about what’s going on outside though, as inside you’ll find smart, contemporary furnishings, AA rosette standard cooking, a large heated pool, gym and spa facilities. Most importantly, it is right next door to the Sauntan East Golf Course.
Restaurant Dress Code Smart dress after 6pm (No Jeans / Trainers)
Day 2 – Saunton, East & West Course
8:30am Tee time at Saunton East Golf Course
2:30pm Tee time at Saunton West Golf Course
After a good night’s rest, you will be visiting the golf course next to your hotel, and playing each of their two course – East & West – for your one and only 36-hole day of the trip.
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Saunton Golf Club
Telephone +44 (0) 1271 812436
Saunton is located on the beautiful unspoiled North Devon coast. The East course, laid out in 1897, runs through a small part of the amazing expanse of sand dunes. Herbert Fowler added a bit of redesign magic in 1919 and very little has changed since. Fowler took full advantage of the natural terrain, routing the holes through the dunes with skill. This is the man who was responsible for the masterpiece at Walton Heath and Saunton is his finest seaside creation.
The East has eight par fours over 400 yards long and only two par fives. Scoring well is very difficult, even more so now that the 2nd hole, once a short par five, has been lengthened to almost 530 yards. There are two excellent short par threes, which demand accuracy, and there’s the tough 207-yard 17th hole, which often needs a decent crack with a wood.
One of the many delights of Saunton is that each fairway tunnels its way through the dunes, providing the feeling that you have each hole to yourself. Saunton has 36 of the finest seaside links holes, making an excellent venue for a golf day. The East Course is ranked No.32 in the Golf World “Top 100 Courses”.
Course Fast Facts:
Yards: 6,477
Year Founded: 1897
Designer(s): Herbert Fowler, Frank Pennink
Day 3 – Royal North Devon
10:30am Tee time at Royal North Devon Golf Club
Before leaving Devonshire, you’ll have a chance to play a round of golf at the oldest links in England – Royal North Devon Golf Club, the tee time is at 11:37am. After the round, you have a 2hr drive south to the heart of Cornwall to check into your second hotel – St. Enodoc Hotel.
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Royal North Devon Golf Club
Telephone: +44 (0)1237 473817
Royal North Devon at Westward Ho! can rightly claim to be the cradle of English Golf. Founded in 1864, it is the oldest golf course in the country and is regarded as the St Andrews of the South. The golf course is as tough as any of the UK’s more famous links layouts and has recently been placed in Golf World ‘s “Top 100 Courses in the World” that a golfer “must play”.
Not only is Royal North Devon a great course, it is also a place of huge historical importance. Inside the warmly welcoming clubhouse, the golf museum, honours boards and the clubs top competition trophies are worth a visit on their own and help to tell the story of the game and this remarkable club’s unique place in it.
The course stretches out to over 7,000 yards from the championship tees (used for the West of England Championship – one of the top amateur events in the calendar), although most will agree that it’s a suitably stiff test at 6,650 yards, especially when the wind blows. Even with today’s modern equipment a par score for the top scratch players is never easy.
Above all, this is a great, natural golf course that is largely unchanged from the moment 100 years ago when Harold Hilton et al pronounced Westward Ho! to be England’s number one competition golf course. “RND” is pure raw exhilaration and ultimately, the experience of playing a fast running links in a stiff breeze still tests the very best in the game.
Course Fast Facts:
Yards: 6,650
Year Founded: 1864
Designer(s): Old Tom Morris
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Your Hotel:
St. Enodoc Hotel
Telephone: +44 (0)1208 863394
A privately owned boutique Hotel in an exquisite hideaway with sweeping views over the Camel estuary. The beach is a stone’s throw from the hotel.
St. Enodoc has sixteen double rooms and four suites. Many have water views and are designed to be both comfortable and practical. Decorated in bright colours and with quirky and original oil paintings on the walls, they are kept to the highest standards by our house-keeping team.The modern bathrooms are well designed and include body products from the local St Kitts Herbery.
Most importantly, the St. Enodoc Golf Club is just a two minute walk away from the hotel. You will be staying two nights.
Day 4 – Trevose
9:30am Tee time at Trevose
Today you will play a morning round at Trevose Golf and Country Club, about a 35-minute drive from your hotel. The early(ish) round provides a great opportunity to enjoy the hotel in the afternoon, whether in the form of a spa appointment, a few pints on the terrace, a nap, or hey – why not all of the above?
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Trevose Golf Course
Telephone: +44 (0)1841 520208
Trevose Golf and Country Club, located along the Atlantic coastline at Constantine Bay has dramatic views across the golden sandy shore of Boobys Bay to the rugged coastline of Trevose Head.
Founded in 1926, the great Harry Colt designed the Championship course at Trevose, and Sir Guy Campbell made minor revisions just before the Second World War. It’s an exhilarating windswept links where little else other than dune grasses survives in the bleakness.
Trevose is a stern test of golf, especially when the wind is up. There are four teeing areas to choose from, and the par 71 links stretches out to a stern 7,079 yards from the back tees. The crumpled fairways are generous in width and the rough is kept short to keep up the speed of play and prevent too many lost balls.
The short holes are also memorable and exciting, especially the 3rd, measuring 166 yards and the 199-yard 11th, with its two-tiered plateau green. The photogenic par five 4th hole is renowned for its glorious greensite location, set hard against Boobys Bay, but many felt the hole failed to live up to its spectacular backdrop. In 2016, as part of Mackenzie and Ebert’s masterplan, it was overhauled with new tees, bunkers and a massive new undulating green. The club is clearly not content to rest on its laurels.
Some excellent facilities accompany the testing Championship course and there’s a very pleasant nine-hole course, designed by Peter Alliss, called the Headland. This shorter course is an nice warm- up ahead of Trevose’s real Championship challenge.
Course Fast Facts:
Yards: 7,079
Year Founded: 1926
Designer(s): Harry Colt, Peter Alliss
Day 5 – St. Enodoc & Stonehenge
10:30am Tee time at St. Enodoc
6:45pm Stonehenge Special Access Tour
Your last full day of the trip, and it’s a big one! For your final round in Cornwall, a mid-morning round at the beautiful St. Enodoc Golf Club, conveniently located less than a quarter-mile from your hotel. This timing gives you the chance for a relaxing morning, as well as the opportunity to pack your bags and check-out without having to hurriedly shove your clothes back into your suitcase.
After the round, you’ll begin the long drive back to London. But on your way, something special. We’ve booked you a Special Access Tour at Stonehenge, the baffling and mysterious rock formations that are an ancient wonder of the world. In a small group, you’ll have the opportunity to hop the ropes and walk among the stones. The tour will take about an hour.
After that, you’ll have a 1hr15 drive to your home for the final night of the trip, the luxurious Coworth Park, where a final nights dinner will be prepared for you on arrival.
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St Enodoc Golf Club on the North Cornwall coast overlooks the Camel Estuary, with Padstow on the far side, and to the North out across the Atlantic. The location on the high sand dunes is ideal for golf combined with stunning sea views.
The club is situated in one of the driest parishes in Cornwall and being on sand is ideal for golf twelve months of the year; even in the depths of winter frost is a rarity thanks to the warm Gulf Stream climate.
Although St Enodoc Golf Club was founded in 1891, it didn’t really become a good golf course until James Braid did a proper design job on it in 1907. Braid returned to update St Enodoc in 1936 and today’s layout hasn’t changed much since.
St Enodoc is certainly a quixotic and rather hilly links course, set amidst towering sand dunes clad with tufts of wild sea grasses. The fairways undulate and ripple just as if the sea had ebbed only moments ago. We have to own up – this is one of our favourite links courses because the terrain is entirely natural. The dunes are so pronounced that you cannot help but feel humbled, the holes are varied and charming and finally, so much of the experience is memorable.
There are many great holes here at St Enodoc, but the 6th is a bit of a collector’s item, a hole of absolute uniqueness, a blind drive followed by a blind mid iron second shot which must carry over a confrontational sand dune called “Himalayas”. This stands some 100 yards out, guarding the hidden green. Let’s be honest, this is an enormous dune, worthy of its name, rising up over 75 feet high.
Course Fast Facts:
Yards: 6,557
Year Founded: 1891
Designer(s): James Braid
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Your Hotel:
Coworth Park
Ascot, England
Located forty-five minutes outside of London and just twenty minutes from Heathrow, Coworth Park is a peaceful sanctuary removed from the chaos of England’s capital.
The property consists of seventy rooms: thirty in the main Manor House and the remaining rooms spread out over the Dower House, Cottages and Stables. The overriding aesthetic is contemporary elegance with many of the rooms in the Manor House featuring four-poster beds and high ceilings. For golfers, you are within 10mns of the great nearby courses, including Swinley Forest.
Day 6 – Sunningdale & the Journey Home
9:00am Tee time at Sunningdale Golf Club
After a nice breakfast at Coworth, you have a 5-minute drive down the road to the renowned Sunningdale Golf Club. We will hope to get you on the Old Course (ranked #29 in the world), but if not the New course is also ranked in the World Top-100 at #73.
Shake hands on the 18th green and make your way back to the coach, who will take you to Heathrow to catch your trans-Atlantic flights home.
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Sunningdale Golf Club
It has been said that Sunningdale is the quintessential English Club and as close to Augusta National as any club in the British Isles. Together, the Old and New course make up one best the best 36-hole pair in the British Isles.
The Old Course
Sunningdale’s Old Course was designed by twice winner of The Open Championship, Willie Park Jr and opened in 1901. The land on which it was constructed belonged to St. John’s College, Cambridge and mainly consisted of heather, gorse and pine trees. There were no shops, no railway station, and no Ridgemount Road, merely a bridle path over the property running, as it still does across the 2nd of the Old and continuing across to the 9th green of the New Course. Willie Park Junior, was consulted and tasked with designing a course of exemplary character, for the price of £3000.
It opened to universal acclaim and was among the first successful courses located away from the coast, as many had believed turf would not grow well in such regions. The Course was considered extremely long and its popularity owed much to the development of the Haskell ball. Credit to Park Jr’s design, The Old Course has stood the test of time, and even now with the advance of modern technology, the course can be challenging to even the longest of hitters.
Many amateur and professional events have been played across the Old Course including the News of the World Professional Match Play, The European Open, Ladies Open Championship, The Walker Cup, Open Championship International Final Qualifying, and most recently the Senior Open Championship in 2009, 2015 and upcoming in 2020.
The Old Course is today considered one of the greatest courses in the World and is regularly found in the top 30 in the world’s rankings.
Course Fast Facts:
Yards: 6,660
Year Founded: 1900
Designer(s): Willie Park, Jr.
