Turnberry, Ailsa Course

The Marquess of Ailsa had the idea in 1899, when a light railway was announced along this coast: 175 acres of his land at Turnberry were too poor to farm and just right for golf. Willie Fernie laid out thirteen holes in 1901, and the hotel opened with the railway station in 1906. The course was an airbase in both wars, and there was doubt it would come back at all until Mackenzie Ross rebuilt it and it reopened in 1951.

The Ailsa sits on a headland on the Firth of Clyde, looking out to Arran and the rock of Ailsa Craig, with the lighthouse standing on the turn of the course. It has held the Open four times, and the 1977 championship here, Tom Watson over Jack Nicklaus by a stroke, is the one people mean when they say Turnberry. The resort has been owned by the Trump Organization since 2014 and is branded Trump Turnberry.