Picture perfect links golf in rich supply in Scotland

Kevin Markham discovers rich pickings on Scotland’s coastlines, east and west...

It was 6.15am and I was standing in the dunes behind Cruden Bay Golf Club’s fourth green. Cocooned between a long beach and a curling ridge of land which rises up above the course, it makes for a perfect links setting. It makes for perfect photo opportunities, too, which was why I was looking down on the fourth green. One problem — a trail of footprints stretched across the glistening dew, drenched green. A golfer had already been and gone.

Perhaps it was the irresistibility of a fine links on a perfect summer’s day that lured the golfer out so early, or perhaps he does it every day.