Turnberry, Troon & Prestwick, Golf Vacation
Turnberry, Royal Troon, Prestwick, Machrihanish, Western Gailes, Machrihanish Dunes, Dundonald and Shiskine
The West-Side Story
Once visiting golfers have ‘done’ St Andrews it isn’t long before their attention turns to Scotland’s Ayrshire coast and the next cluster of world-class links, the Turnberry Troon and Prestwick Golf Vacation features some of Scotland’s most illustrious names. Turnberry is perennially ranked in the world’s top-20, and home of the legendry 1977 ‘Duel in the Sun’ between Nicklaus and Watson. It is the most aesthetically pleasing links on the Open championship rotation with the most exhilarating stretch of coastal golf in the world. Royal Troon is another Open course famed for ‘the Postage Stamp’ and the ‘Railway Hole’. Prestwick completes the trio of Open venues, having hosted the original event in 1860, and has itself earned a place on the prestigious world-top-100 ranking. Regarded by many as having the best opening hole in golf, the wild links of Machrihanish on the Kintyre Peninsula add a fourth ensuring this particular Scottish package golf tour contains the most top-100 ranked courses of any region
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The Itinerary
Friday – Machrihanish
Saturday – Machrihanish Dunes (Campbeltown)
Sunday – Shiskine (Isle of Arran)
Monday – Western Gailes
Tuesday – Royal Troon
Wednesday – Turnberry Ailsa (Culzean Castle)
Thursday – Dundonald
Friday – Prestwick (Glasgow)
Friday - Machrihanish
Perched on the western most tip of the Kintyre Peninsula, Machrihanish is wild, remote, windswept and very, beautiful. As you might expect being just 12 miles from Northern Ireland, the coast shares some Irish traits, notably dramatic high dune systems, whereas the subtle undulations in the fairways are more Scottish. This is pure links theatre.
Golf Digest has rated Machrihanish as high as the 57th best course in the world. It’s top drawer. It also possesses what many regard as the finest opening tee shot in the UK, played over the beach onto the fairway beyond, and daring you to carve off more and more until you perish. It sets the tone for an exhilarating round.
It would be criminal however to suggest that Machrihanish is one great opening hole and that’s it. The entire front nine are exceptional and magical experience is we sail our over rolling fairways and dunes. The greens are firm, fast, true and are positioned in the most varied of locations. Some are sunk in punchbowls allowing us to run out, whilst others are on a raised plateau or flattened dune tops which will slam the door, or challenge us to ride the wind all the way into the target. There are blind tee shots, fabulous sea views, undulating rippling fairways and exciting rugged dunes.
Saturday - Machrihanish Dunes
Scotland is the home of golf, but in terms of finding a course that most faithfully observes the games foundations we might turn to something surprisingly modern. If you want to experience a links challenge similar to that which the games pioneers faced, then ‘Mach Dunes’ is it. This is the perfect symbiosis of natural landscape and hazard in harmony. The pioneers who took to the links land didn’t have mechanical earth moving machinery. They looked into the landscape, worked with it, and went about conceiving their own challenges. In time consensus emerged which gave way to the adoption of ‘routes’ which duly became courses. Of its 270 acres only 7 have been subject to earth working. The rough is managed by two flocks of roaming sheep with grazing rights, and bunkers are developments of burrowing animals! This is authentic links, and actually genuine.
Sunday - Shiskine
The 12 hole course at Shiskine is likely to be one of the most unusual and fun courses we’ll ever play (yes we said 12 holes). We sail to the Isle of Arran (30 minutes from Claonaig) where we’ll find some of Scotland’s best nine hole courses. Everyone loves a dramatic par 3, and Shiskine has a plethora of them (seven in total), and they often play from dramatic tee boxes or hit into equally stunning locations. The course is set on a post glacial, post volcanic landscape due to a geological fault-line that bisects the island, which makes it even more dramatic
We noted that Arran can potentially offer us a bit more than just Shiskine though, so it would perhaps be remiss not to mention a nine-hole gem on the other side of the island called Corrie, that we might be able to add using a protocol of ‘turn up and play’ and put the green fee in an honesty box
Monday - Western Gailes
Often described as the area’s ‘hidden gem’, Western Gailes embodies much that is typical of the Ayrshire links sandwiched as it is between the sea and the ubiquitous railway line.
Reading the fickle wind that snaps in off the adjacent Firth of Clyde, is the key. The challenge is compounded by undulating terrain, and finely contoured greens cleverly set in the folds of the sand dunes. The line of dunes runs the coastal stretch from the 5th to the 13th. Another links staple appears at the 14th, an out of bounds wall. Pot bunkers and fairway burns, are also much in evidence, which combine with traditional vegetative defenders, gorse and heather to present <em>‘the’</em> archetypal links challenge.
We’ve never seen Western Gailes feature in a world-top-100 ranking, but it’s prominence in the same rating organisations Scottish lists us to conclude that it has to be world-top-200
Tuesday - Royal Troon
Troon is a traditional links and has hosted the Open a total of ten times. Make your score going out. The inward nine against the omni-present wind is always a trial, made harder by hideously deep rough interspersed with thick gorse and broom.
The par 3, eighth, described by Willie Park as “a pitching surface skimmed down to the size of a Postage Stamp” is the signature hole. The name stuck, and today it’s one the most recognisable short holes in the global game
It’s the par 4, eleventh, ‘the Railway Hole’, that’s the most feared though. In 1997 Tiger Woods carded an eight here. Jack Nicklaus was even more chewed up. He returned a ten in 1962. You have to wonder if there is a hole anywhere in world golf where Jack and Tiger have each signed for quadruples?
More recently Troon staged the memorable 2016 Championship. Henrik Stenson edged Phil Mickelson in one of the most stunning displays of head-to-head play in Major Championship history. They pulled a remarkable 11 shots clear, both shooting record equalling 63’s en-route.
Wednesday - Turnberry
The iconic Stevenson lighthouse sitting on its craggy headland in amongst the ruins of Turnberry castle, and with views of Ailsa Craig and the Isle of Arran out to sea, plus a tendency to put on spectacular sunsets, Turnberry is the most aesthetic of all the Open venues. In modern golfing legend Turnberry is forever etched in the pages of history as the location for the ‘duel in the sun’ from 1977 when Tom Watson narrowly prevailed over Jack Nicklaus with the rest nowhere. Myths are made in moments, but legends last a lifetime.
In 2016 the course finished it’s stunning redevelopment. The new holes 9-11, look set to become the signature stretch. Not so much Amen Corner, as perhaps a Rocky Horror! The fifth is the hardest on the course and has been toughened up further. The fourteenth, an infinity hole out to sea might become the most awe inspiring.
Is Turnberry the best course in Scotland? We don’t know, it’s a hotly contested accolade, but it’s certainly in any conversation
Thursday - Dundonald
Flushed by the success of Kingsbarns, the ambitions of Ayrshire and Kyle Phillips conveniently and naturally collided as one wanted something similar, and the other wanted a new project. Phillips set about building another brand new links type course drawing on his observation of tradition through enhancing the existing, rather than manufacturing the phoney. It’s being faithful to this philosophy that leads us to think these courses are much older. Dundonald is starting to gain wider acclaim as it matures. In 2017 it became a European tour venue hosting Scottish Open won by Rafa Cabrera Bello (Rory missed the cut).
Dundonald is now established in the family of links just below ‘Major’ standard
Friday - Prestwick
Prestwick is the home of the first ever Open Championship of Golf, and therefore the genesis of all such modern variants played since. This is your chance to tackle the original ‘Open’ undulations, the narrowest fairway in Europe, and the continents ‘biggest bunker’.
Surprisingly for golf (but less so when you think how the game came to the west coast) Prestwick has a little of a ‘blue collar’ tradition to it
Today’s course remains surprisingly faithful. Unreasonable fairway ricochets, and a plethora of ‘blind shots’ abound. Six of the original greens played from 1860 are still in use. A number of holes, including the famous par 5, ‘Cardinal’ have only received the absolute minimal alteration over the decades. The opening ‘Railway hole’ is another timeless links classic.
Prestwick’s quirky and charismatic. To play here, really is to step back in time. No where is quite like it, nor can it be.
Featured Group
What's Involved?
The Turnberry, Troon & Prestwick golf vacation is predominantly a daily back-to-base model based on the town of Troon. If we decide to include the full roster of possible courses and include the Machrihanish duo we’ll need to spend two nights on the Kintyre Peninsula at Campbeltown, linking the two areas together by a ferry via the Isle of Arran
We perhaps need to note however that the Ayrshire coast is amongst the weaker Scottish regions for non-golf interest, and whereas there might be a few options for a little bit, there needn’t be depth to hold six days of interest. Anyone considering this with non-golfers might be advised to think carefully
The Turnberry, Troon & Prestwick, Golf Vacation is laid out as an eight night duration, that predominantly observes a daily back-to-base model.
- Campbeltown (2 nights)
- Troon (6 nights)
It is possible to clip the two off Cambpeltown for the loss of the Machrihanish courses and reduce it to six nights if you prefer. If we wanted to pursue of bit of luxury we might choose to slip a night or two in at Turnberry as well
A more popular option is to just focus on the ‘big name courses’ and seek a two or three night stay at Turnberry or in Troon, and then combine with another region
At approximately 350 miles, The Turnberry, Troon & Prestwick, Golf Vacation is a low mileage/ low intensity transport burden, especially when we consider that about 130 miles of this would be driving between Glasgow and Machrihanish. There’d be another 100 miles associated with getting to Ardrossan/ Troon via the Isle of Arran as well. The actual Ayrshire leg need only be about 120 miles.
In total, the Turnberry, Troon & Prestwick, Golf Vacation should demand approximately 11 hrs road time, although about 90 mins of this will be spent on car ferries
We will need to catch two car ferries
- Claonaig to Lochranza (Isle of Arran) – 30 mins
- Brodick (Isle of Arran) to Troon or Ardrossan – 55 mins
The crossing are on the Firth of Clyde, a relatively well sheltered piece of water where land is always within sight
If we object to using the ferries, then there is an alternative ‘long way round’ which in terms of time at least, is about the same as the ferries. The biggest difference is that the mileage is lower if we sail
The Turnberry, Troon & Prestwick, Golf Vacation can support Luxury, Premier and Affordable options.
The Turnberry course hotel represents the former, whereas the Marine hotel and Piersland hotel in Troon can represent either dependent on the room type selected.
If we venture onto the Kintyre Peninsula (Machrihanish) we probably don’t have a strict luxury option, but do have a premier class four-star at the Royal hotel in Campbeltown
As ever, the scale of non-golf activity depends on whether we’re adding extra value for golfers, or building a stand alone proposal for non-golfers to run alongside a golf programme.
- Campbeltown with Machrihanish Dunes
- Isle of Arran with Shiskine
- Culzean Castle with Turnberry
- Glasgow with Prestwick
Ayrshire wouldn’t be amongst Scotland’s stronger regions so if we’ve got any non-golfers on a full duration we perhaps need to consider this.
Troon is a pleasant enough seaside town, but will struggle for a week. Culzean Castle is credible alongside Turnberry, as would be Glasgow alongside Prestwick, but once we exhaust these, we need to start looking further afield (or even over the sea to the Isle of Arran)
Faraway Fairways couldn’t really advise in good faith that the Turnberry, Troon & Prestwick, Golf Vacation offers the non-golfer a deep and rich experience. Ayrshire is one of Scotland’s weakest regions in this regard
The following courses operate the following handicap thresholds for gentlemen and ladies respectively
- Royal Troon (20 & 30)
- Western Gailes (24 & 28)
- Machrihanish (24 & 36)
Prestwick appear to have downgraded their previous ‘ask’ of 24 & 28, to “preferred”
Troon only permits visitor play on Mon, Tues & Thurs
Turnberry will allow visitors to play a morning tee-time if they’re prepared to pay an exorbitant green. Hotel guests pay the guest rate
Prestwick don’t permit visitor play on Saturday’s or Sunday mornings
Western Gailes don’t permit morning visitor play on Tues, Thurs, Sat or Sun
St Andrews is on the east coast. Ayrshire is on the west coast. Although it’s possible to add it if staying at Troon, it’s probably not recommended. It’ll take about 3 hrs to drive there. If we drew an early tee-time this would be a demanding wake up call! The more sensible approach would be to add it as breakout section as part of a dual destination plan
The other approach we might adopt is to contest tee-times from 10.30 onwards, since we can apply in specified 30 minute blocks
About Activities
Isle of Arran
Geologically, the Isle of Arran is often described as a ‘mini Scotland’. A circular road allows you to discover the various settlements dotted around the island, and takes about 2½ hours to circumnavigate. Highlights include the castles of Brodick, and Lochranza, the ancient standing stones at Machrie Moor, and the whisky distillery
Glasgow
If Edinburgh was built on commerce, Glasgow was built on industry, with the consequence that the city has a very different personality. Glasgow has always a been vibrant city and is very much more a people’s city. Culturally famous for the design school of Charles Rennie Macintosh, in recent years its developed a buzzing arts scene.
Testimonial
From BB Canada
“I told Alun the courses I was interested in playing and he prepared a stay and play package with 14 days of outstanding golf, but also tremendous site seeing opportunities for my wife.”
From JC Illinois
“His attention to detail is amazing--I think our travel plan booklet ran to forty-eight pages, with gorgeous descriptions of cities and sights, plus maps showing where to go to catch trains, or walk from trains to hotels, sights and golf courses, etc.”
From DF Alabama
“I will cherish the memories for a long time- especially the wonderful times spent on and off the golf course with two of my brothers and brother-in-law. None of the memories and golf would have been possible or enjoyed without your tremendous planning and logistical support.”
AS from Colorado
“Alun and Faraway Fairways created possibly the most memorable golf trip we have ever experienced. EPIC is the only word that comes to mind.”
AC, From Florida/ New York, 2025
“We were hopeful to secure a 4 ball at St. Andrews while avoiding the massive expense other operators had quoted. He was very clear about the plan for achieving a tee time at the Old Course through the ballot, including detailed instruction on how it could be done, and what our odds were. He suggested mid- to late April as the best chance of success and advised that this is also the least rainy part of the year. We took his advice and trusted the process. Well, he was right on all counts!”
From SB, Minnesota
“We wholeheartedly recommend Alun and Faraway Fairways if you’re looking for a golf trip that is effortless, enjoyable, and truly unforgettable—even for a non-golfer in the mix! My husband and I will be daydreaming about this trip for years to come. 5.5 stars!”
From JB, California
“The best part was that the service was surprisingly affordable. They were thousands of dollars below other quotes that I received, in fact the prices were very similar to what I would have paid if I would have booked everything on my own.”
From JCA, Maryland
“I would and will highly recommend your company to anyone looking to plan an unforgettable golf trip. Thank You for putting together a fantastic trip for J.C. and me”
From WF Connecticut
“I think all eight of us would agree that Alun at Faraway Fairways did an absolutely wonderful job of putting this “golf vacation of a lifetime” together for us. His focus on the details was extraordinary from the choice of courses and the timing of the tee times, the amazingly beautiful accommodations along with some excellent meal selections, and the transportation options he provided to get us from place to place.”
From DR South Carolina
“You are about to tee it up in your Major. Seek wisdom, integrity and professionalism. Alun Davies and Faraway Fairways will not disappoint you. They cannot assure a calm sunny day with temperatures in the 70’s on the Old Course.”
From MM, California
“One fantastic trip you organized, and more importantly took ownership of in terms of daily communication and stewardship during our 2+ weeks in Scotland and Ireland. The logistics were spotless…100% of the transports were on time and excellent, the lodging choices spectacular and the golf was off the charts in terms of quality and arrangements made”
DH from California
“You cannot go wrong with the support Faraway Fairways offered. I did this trip solo and all last minute but I have already begun to plan the next trip which will include my best golfing buddies.”
Enquiry
We don't need to make this an ordeal by 101 filtering questions! In reality there are probably little more than half a dozen things we need to know to build out a proposal. The guidance below might help you frame answers
Duration - usually best expressed as a range up to a maximum
Time of year - can be anything from a specific date range to a named season
Travel class - Faraway Fairways uses 'Luxury', 'Premier' or 'Affordable' for generic purposes. You might choose to reference the international 'star' rating system. We're only looking for something to help steer us into the right sector
Self drive or hired driver - In broad terms, self driving is normally less expensive, and much more flexible, but some folk just don't want to do it
Must play courses/ must do places - a few name checks is all that's needed