Castlerock (Bann)

‍If you’ve got a spare hour, 90 minutes at most, I would urge you to give it a quick whirl. It actually enjoys the best of the duneland, at the mouth of the River Bann, and is a fantastic warm-up for the main course.

You must walk a good five minutes through a neighbouring caravan park to locate the first tee but once you are there, and have played the modest, lay-of-the-land, getaway hole, it’s non-stop fun with lots of quirk! You will play to rollicking fairways, greens in secret dells and to flags atop of plateaus.

Don’t mistake this for anything less than serious golf though; there are several top drawer holes. There are only nine of them in total and the par-34 layout measures a princely 2,446-yards but it packs a big punch.

If The Club wanted to they could pinch some land from this course to enhance the main links but that would be to the detriment of this delightful short and sporty course. The back-to-back one-shotters (3 & 4) are a true joy, as is the entire course. The first of these successive par-threes is just 92-yards but has a terrifyingly narrow volcanic entrance - the solitary bunker on the entire course is way down to the left and a steep drop to the right - whilst the next is do-or-die in terms of hitting the green.

The 2nd, 6th, 7th and 8th are all medium to short par fours and each one plays really well whilst the 9th – another par-three – has the most unusual green where a back right pocket could potentially hide the flag from view off the tee thanks to a huge dune!

It’s a serious nine-holes but I’d suggest you to not take it too seriously and just enjoy the ride.

Read the review of Castlerock (Mussenden) here.