Carnoustie, St Andrews, Edinburgh or Surrey: planning a British golf weekend that gets played

Every golf society has a trip that exists only in the group chat: the week in Ireland, the fortnight on the Algarve, the grand tour of Open venues that someone costs out each January and nobody books. The trip that actually happens is smaller. Two nights, a car or a train, a handful of rounds within reach of one bed, and everyone home by Sunday teatime.

Planned well, that weekend is better golf than the big tour, not a consolation prize. What makes it work is less the fame of the courses than three dull decisions: where you base yourselves, how many rounds you ask of tired legs, and what format keeps a 6 handicapper and a 30 handicapper laughing on the same card.

Start with the base, then fill in the courses

Most failed weekends start from a single famous course and bolt the rest on, which means packing the car every morning and spending the best of the daylight on the A-roads.

Turn it round. Pick a town or a venue where several rounds sit within a short drive, or better still on one site, book one place to stay, and let the tee times follow. You unpack once, breakfast is not a race, and when the rain comes in sideways on Saturday you can swap courses without rebuilding the trip.

Britain is unusually well supplied with that kind of base. Here are four quite different ones, with the facts that matter when you book.

Where to base a British golf weekend: four options

Carnoustie: three links on one site

Carnoustie Golf Links runs three 18-hole courses from the same place: the Championship Course, which has hosted The Open since 1931, plus the Burnside and the Buddon. For a weekend that is close to perfect. Its 2026 “play all three” offer covers a round on each within three consecutive days, from £349.50 a head in April and £480 from May to October, and an extra round on the Burnside or Buddon costs £90 on the same or the following day.

Book a caddie for the Championship Course if the budget stretches: the published fee is £80 per bag plus a gratuity, with at least 24 hours’ notice strongly recommended. If anyone is flying in without clubs, TaylorMade hire sets are £60 a day and PowaKaddy electric trolleys £25 a round.

St Andrews: eight courses and a shuttle bus

St Andrews Links operates eight courses, from the Old, New and Jubilee beside the town to the Castle and Craigtoun on the outskirts and the nine-hole Balgove for a last-evening knockabout. Between 30 March and 24 October 2026 a free shuttle bus links the Links and Eden clubhouses, the Old Pavilion and the Golf Academy, except on Sundays, so a weekend group can leave the cars parked.

Two details save disappointment. The Old Course is the only one of the eight that requires a handicap certificate, with a limit of 36, and it must be shown to the starter; a letter will not be accepted. And if a place on the Old comes through the ballot, the green fee is paid to the starter on the day, so build the rest of the weekend on the other courses and treat the Old as a bonus.

Edinburgh: six council courses on one pass

The cheapest serious golf weekend in the country may be the capital’s council courses. Edinburgh Leisure runs six: Braid Hills high above the city, the coastal Silverknowes, parkland Carrick Knowe and Craigentinny, the nine-hole Portobello, one of the oldest nine-hole courses in Scotland, and the par-3 Wee Braids. A 3-day golf pass at £45 opens all of them, with a 7-day pass at £75.

The catches are small but real. The pass cannot be bought from overseas, so a visiting friend must wait until they are in the UK, and there is no formal dress code, which suits a mixed group. Add a train into Waverley and a night in the city, and the golf becomes the cheap part of the weekend.

Surrey: three courses at one centre

For a southern group that wants something gentler, Hoebridge Golf Centre in Woking puts a par-73 Main Course, the nine-hole Shey Copse and a par-3 short course that takes about 90 minutes on one site, alongside a floodlit Trackman range. The Main Course costs visitors £45 before 1pm from Monday to Thursday, £56 at weekends and £24 after 5pm. A Friday evening nine, a Saturday morning eighteen and a Sunday short-course match makes a weekend with room for lunch.

Before any of these, check the course status page. On the day this was written, Hoebridge listed greens work in progress on its Main Course, and every venue publishes changes like that online first.

How much golf a body can take

Thirty-six holes a day for three days looks efficient on a spreadsheet. On a links in a stiff breeze it is a march of several miles a round with a bag or trolley, and by Saturday afternoon the swings have gone and so has the humour.

Budget one full round a day as the backbone. Add a second only where it is short: the Balgove, Portobello, the Wee Braids or a par-3 course are ideal for that, because they are sociable, quick and forgiving of tired legs. The group will play better golf, and the stories will be about good shots rather than blisters.

Formats for a group of mixed handicaps

Medal play across three rounds with a spread of handicaps produces long faces and slow rounds. Stableford solves most of it: under Rule 21.1 a player whose score can no longer earn a point simply picks up, so one disastrous hole costs a zero rather than a ten.

Mix in pairs formats. A Texas scramble on the first afternoon gets everyone involved while swings are rusty, and a four-ball better-ball on the last morning gives the weekend a proper finish. For the handicaps, The R&A’s recommended allowances are a sensible default: 95% for individual stroke play, 85% for four-ball stroke play and 90% for four-ball match play. Appendix C of the Rules of Handicapping adds that, for fields of fewer than 30 players, a 100% allowance could be considered, which suits a society of eight or twelve.

Keep a running table across the whole trip and buy a trophy that costs less than a round of drinks. Nothing does more for the mood on Sunday morning.

Money, drop-outs and the weather clause

Collect every penny before anything is booked: green fees, the accommodation and a kitty for dinner. The organiser who pays up front and chases people afterwards does it once.

Agree the drop-out rule at the same time. Ask each venue how late a group booking can be reduced, write that date in the chat, and make it clear that after it, a withdrawal is paid for by the person withdrawing.

Then read each course’s bad-weather policy, because a British weekend will test it. Carnoustie’s is a good example of how specific these are: if golfers abandon a round because of lightning or haar rather than waiting, no refund applies, while visitors whose time cannot be rescheduled after a rain closure are offered one. Nobody wants to discover that on the first tee.

Choosing the squad

Golf weekends go wrong because of people far more often than because of courses.

Eight is the ideal number: two four-balls, one table for dinner, and every pairs format available. Twelve works if someone genuinely enjoys organising. Six leaves a lopsided three-ball somewhere, and four becomes the same conversation for three days.

A wide spread of handicaps is fine if the format absorbs it. What cannot be fixed by a format is a slow player or someone who sulks for nine holes after a bad drive. Think about that before the invitations go out, not on the second evening. Change the pairings every round so that eight friends do not turn into two cliques by Saturday.

What goes in the boot

• Full waterproofs and a spare glove, because the first morning will be wet somewhere.
• A second pair of shoes, and something to dry the first pair overnight.
• More balls than seems sensible, and a marker pen so the group can tell them apart.
• Proof of handicap on your phone, for courses that ask.
• A warm layer for the evening nine, even in June.

Turning one weekend into a fixture

The weekends that last have a little structure. Fix the month, and book the following year’s dates before everyone leaves on Sunday. Rotate the organiser. Keep a single page with the venues, the formats, the cost per head and what went wrong, so next year’s plan takes an evening rather than a month of messages.

And leave one evening with no golf in it. Ten years on, nobody remembers the Stableford totals. They remember the night in the pub when the trophy was invented.

If the group eventually outgrows a weekend, the same rules scale up for a winter trip abroad. Settle nerves on the first tee of a famous links the same way as at home.

Prices and offers above were published by the venues for 2026 and change often; check each course’s own page before booking. Panxis Golf has no commercial relationship with any venue named here.

The weekend in five decisions

1. One base with several rounds nearby, ideally on one site.
2. One full round a day, plus a short course if legs allow.
3. Stableford and pairs formats, with agreed allowances and a running table.
4. All the money in, and a drop-out date, before booking.
5. Eight players you would happily share a car with for three days.

Where this shows up on a course

Three courses from our directory worth the detour.

• Moray Golf Club: Old Tom Morris laid out the Lossiemouth links in 1889, sixteen holes at first: revetted bunkers, gorse-lined fairways and a par 71 finishing back towards the town.
• Kilmarnock (Barassie) Golf Club: Championship links on the Ayrshire belt at a fraction of what the neighbours charge: fast greens, fair rough, and the honest caveat that it is not quite a pure links.
• Kingsbarns Golf Links: Kyle Phillips built a convincing links out of Fife farmland in 2000: a mile and three-quarters of coastline, tour-standard conditioning, and the argument about what it costs.

We have not played these courses; each page says what it is based on.