Irish golf’s new green wave

IF Mark Twain truly believed that golf is a good walk spoiled, he obviously never set foot on the Old Head of Kinsale, a course in southwest Ireland cut from apromontory jutting out into the Atlantic Ocean.

The jaw-dropping views of the rugged 100-foot cliffs along the southwest coast, no doubt, would have inspired the famous author to write another literary masterpiece. Golfers who have played Pebble Beach Golf Links and Whistling Straits — two 2010 major championship sites with stunning shoreline settings of their own in the United States — can vouch with firm conviction that neither compares to the magic of the Old Head on a sunny day.

The Old Head experience — playing in the shadow of the iconic lighthouse, walking through old stone ruins near the seventh tee, chatting up some of the best caddies in Europe, a tasty post-round lunch on the patio overlooking the course, or even staying in the new luxury suites below the stone clubhouse — can cause sensory overload.