The Wardlaw Museum – Sea Views and Afternoon Tea
A few hours, from St Andrews bus station and back.
The route
The Wardlaw Museum is the University of St Andrews' own, free to visit, and full of the art, science and history the university has gathered, with a terrace that looks out over the West Sands and the sea.
From there it's a lovely walk along The Scores and beside the 18th fairway to the Old Course Hotel, where afternoon tea comes with a view across the Old Course itself. Afternoon tea is served on Saturdays and Sundays only.
Before you go
Book accommodation nearby
If you are staying over: here are ours nearest where the day starts and ends.
Book Afternoon tea at the Old Course Hotel
Book afternoon tea at the Old Course Hotel by phone on 01334 474371 or online for about 1pm on a Saturday or Sunday, the only days it's served (1pm to 3pm, from £40 a person at the time of writing, children's tea £18): card details are taken when you book, and cancelling within 24 hours or not turning up costs £20 a person.
The day
St Andrews
An unhurried afternoon on foot: an hour or so among the university's treasures on the cliff top, then a stroll beside the links to a long, elegant tea looking over the Old Course.
About four hours
Wardlaw Museum
It's about a 13-minute walk from the bus station to the Wardlaw Museum at 7 The Scores, on the cliff top above the sea. It's free and open every day from 10am to 5pm. Four galleries take you inside the university, through its art, science and natural history collections and the research that has come out of it, alongside exhibitions that change through the year. Step out onto the terrace for the view over the West Sands, the links, Tentsmuir Forest and the North Sea, with a free talking telescope to tell you what you're looking at.
20 min on foot
Old Course Hotel
Afternoon tea
From the museum it's about 20 minutes' walk west along The Scores and The Links beside the 18th fairway to the Old Course Hotel for afternoon tea. It's served on Saturdays and Sundays only, 1pm to 3pm, from £40 a person at the time of writing, with a children's tea at £18. Book ahead by phone or online. If it's full, 18 at Rusacks on Pilmour Links serves afternoon tea from 12.30pm; ring to check its days. From the hotel it's 12 minutes' walk back to the bus station.
If it rains
Both are indoors: on a wet afternoon only the 13-minute walk up from the bus station, the 20 minutes along The Scores and The Links and the 12 minutes back are out in it, so save the museum's terrace for a dry day.
Photograph by John Gavin Lighterness via Google