Durness Golf Club – Nine Holes on the North Coast
A few hours.
The route
Durness Golf Club is a nine-hole links on the far north coast, laid out by three local golfers and opened in 1988, with a second set of tees that makes eighteen.
The round ends on a par three played across a sea inlet to a small green on the far side. Then walk it off on the white sands of Balnakeil Bay next door. A fine half day for golfers, beginners with hired clubs included.
Before you go
Book accommodation nearby
If you are staying over: here are ours nearest where the day starts and ends.
The day
Balnakeil
A round on the links above Balnakeil Bay, then a walk on the sands below them. Bring layers: there's nothing between the course and the sea wind.
About three and a half hours
Durness Golf Club
Durness Golf Club is on the little road from Durness to Balnakeil, at the clubhouse above the bay. The course is open every day from 8am until sunset, and there's no need to book. Reserve and pay for a tee time online if you like, or pay at the clubhouse when it's staffed, by the QR code at its door, or in the cash honesty box. Nine holes are £30 and eighteen £55, juniors half price, and clubs can be hired for £10, with a trolley for £2.50; email the club to reserve them. The second set of tees turns nine holes into eighteen. Look out for the 6th, the course's only par five, which sweeps round Loch Lanlish, and the par-three 9th, played across a sea inlet to a small green on the far side. Allow about two hours for nine. Members' competitions take some Sundays, so check the club's fixture list. Café 19 in the clubhouse is licensed, with soup, sandwiches and cakes; its hours are on its Facebook page. From November to February the light goes by about half past three, so tee off by 1pm.
Balnakeil Beach
An attraction
Balnakeil Bay is two minutes' drive from the clubhouse, back along the road and up the short branch that ends by an old white house and the roofless church. Park there. Beyond them a long, wide beach of pale sand curves north under a great bank of marram-covered dunes, with the rocky finger of Faraid Head reaching out to sea at the far end. Walk out along the sands as far as you like and back. When the sea is up it breaks in long white lines, so keep children back from the water. On the road back towards Durness, Cocoa Mountain in Balnakeil Craft Village does hot chocolate every day from March to November, 9am to 6pm; it's shut from December to February.
If it rains
Golf goes on in the rain, but the wind off the sea is the thing to watch; Café 19 in the clubhouse is the place to wait out a shower.
Cocoa Mountain Balnakeil, a café in Durness.
Photographs by Alister Smith and V NM via Google