Tropicana Magazine Nov-Dec 2018 #121: Festive Frivolities

THE SWING
WATERVILLE GOLF LINKS
OLD HEAD GOLF LINKS
A links course whose beauty will drive you to distraction, you’ll
be advised to keep your eye on the ball when playing at Old Head
Golf Links in County Cork or you may never see it again. A Tiger
Woods favourite, nature lovers will be at a distinct disadvantage.
Located at the southernmost tip of Ireland’s romantic Wild
Atlantic Way, hares and seabirds are frequently spotted along
its rocky promontory while humpback whales seasonally frolic
beyond its cliff top drops in the pounding waves beneath.
OLD HEAD GOLF LINKS
WATERVILLE GOLF LINKS
Appearing on Top 100 Courses in the World lists with regularity,
Waterville has been blessed with spectacular views over the Ring
of Kerry and was a firm favourite with late US Open and US PGA
champion Payne Stewart. Perched on a promontory surrounded
by sea, its rugged landscape of natural wind-whipped sand dunes,
native grass and wicked bunkers mood-shifts in synchronicity with
the temperamental weather that rolls in off the vast Atlantic Ocean.
Players must be sure to play close to the ground to maintain an edge.
ROYAL COUNTY DOWN
A magical links course whose hypnotic charms have flummoxed
greats like Jack Nicklaus and Tom Watson, Royal County Down is
not one for the faint hearted. Curled like a sleeping dragon under
shadow of the Mourne Mountains, it is considered by many, PGA
Tour player Rickie Fowler included, to be the perfect links course,
a boast cemented by its frequent appearance atop Golf Digest’s
Top 100 Courses in the World list. A private, by-invitation-only
members club it consists of the Championship and Annesley links,
and the scenery of its surrounds has inspired C.S. Lewis to write
the Narnia Chronicles and attracted the cast and crew of ‘Game Of
Thrones’ which has shot scenes nearby.
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NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2018 | TM