Top Lighthouses in Golf

There’s something idyllically evocative about a lighthouse on a golf course. It’s a sure sign—a beacon—that the course is located along a coastline, which almost always makes for a special setting in the golf world.

The golf course lighthouse often provides a terrific backdrop, adding depth, history, and a touch of tranquility.

sankaty head
Sankaty Head (photo by L.C. Lambrecht)

Sankaty Head Golf Club on Nantucket Island sits near one of the most iconic lighthouses in the game, one that serves as the private club’s logo and stands prominently on the approach to a handful of greens. Bayonne Golf Club in New Jersey, Wentworth by The Sea in New Hampshire, and Old Lighthouse Club at Quivira Los Cabos in Mexico are among other private courses with well-known golf lighthouses.

The following is a rundown of nine lighthouses that feature prominently at public-access golf courses around the world, from Hawaii to Australia.

 

Cape Wickham Golf LinksTasmania, Australia

Just under an hour from Melbourne, on the northeastern tip of King Island, Cape Wickham is one of the game’s great remote destinations. Every hole boasts an ocean view, with co-designers Mike DeVries and Darius Oliver routing the course under the watchful view of the 157-foot Cape Wickham Lighthouse that’s the tallest in Australia as well as the tallest stone lighthouse in the southern hemisphere.

wickham
Cape Wickham (photo by L.C. Lambrecht)

 

Cobble Beach Golf LinksKemble, Ontario, Canada

Ranked as one of the top courses in Canada, Cobble Beach offers spectacular views of Georgian Bay from every hole of its Doug Carrick-designed layout. The waterfront golf resort community, a 2.5-hour drive from Toronto, features a lighthouse near the 17th green and 18th tee that’s a tribute to several spots along the shoreline that were used as survey points by the British admiralty in the early 1800s.

golf lighthouses
Cobble Beach

 

Harbour Town Golf LinksHilton Head Island, S.C.

One of the more celebrated stops on the PGA Tour, Harbour Town is unique in that it was a design collaboration between Pete Dye and a young Jack Nicklaus. But the most recognizable aspect of this course is the red and white striped lighthouse that stands sentinel behind the 18th green that juts into Calibogue Sound.

harbour town
Harbour Town (photo courtesy The Sea Pines Resort)

 

Highland LinksNorth Truro, Mass.

Another course that leans into the lighthouse as its logo, Highland Links is a 9-hole treasure perched along bluffs overlooking the Atlantic Ocean. The Scottish-inspired course, which originally had sand greens when it was founded in the late 1800s, is one of the oldest golf facilities in Cape Cod and is situated next to the Highland Light Station that’s owned by the National Park Service.

Highland Links
Highland Links

 

Ocean Course at HōkūalaKauai, Hawaii

Not far from the Kauai airport, Hōkūala winds through mango and guava groves before reaching seaside cliffs and the longest continuous stretch of oceanfront golf in the Hawaiian Islands. Part of the Timbers Kauai resort, the 16th hole is a dangerous but drivable par four that features the small Kuki’i Point Lighthouse sitting on a lava rock outcropping just off the green at the entrance to Nawiliwili Harbor.

Ocean Course at Hōkūala
Ocean Course at Hōkūala (photo courtesy Hōkūala)

 

Old Head Golf LinksKinsale, Co. Cork, Ireland

It’s hard to top this as the most spectacular lighthouse location in the golf world, as the Old Head of Kinsale is a stunning headland on the southwest coast of Ireland that juts more than two miles into the Atlantic Ocean. At the tip of this almost inconceivable piece of golf property, behind the 18th tees, is the existing lighthouse built in 1853. The remains of two earlier lighthouses, built in 1667 and 1814, can still be seen near the 6th and 7th tees.

exhilerating golf
Old Head (photo by Evan Schiller)

 

Pacific Grove Golf LinksPacific Grove, Calif.

One of golf’s great municipal courses, the back nine of Pacific Grove has been called a “poor man’s Pebble Beach” with a routing that winds through windswept dunes along the ocean. This stretch plays around the picturesque Point Pinos Lighthouse, which was built in 1960 on land the City of Pacific Grove leased from the U.S. Coast Guard.

golf lighthouses
Pacific Grove

 

Trump Turnberry (Ailsa)Ayrshire, Scotland

This could be the most iconic golf course lighthouse, as the Ailsa course has hosted four Open Championships and is widely regarded as one of the top links layouts in the UK. Set along the Ayrshire coastline, the nearly 80-foot-tall lighthouse dates to 1873 and was recently (in 2016) transformed into one of the best halfway houses in the game. It’s also home to a two-bedroom luxury suite.

turnberry
Ailsa Course at Trump Turnberry (photo by Kevin Murray)

 

Samoset Resort—Rockport, Maine

The lighthouse on this list located furthest from a golf course is the Rockland Breakwater Lighthouse, which sits at the end of a granite breakwater that’s almost one mile long. Owned by the City of Rockland, the lighthouse is directly in front of the Samoset Resort and in view from several holes along Penobscot Bay.

Samoset Resort
Samoset Resort

 

What other lighthouses on public golf courses should make this list?

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Matt Barr
3 months ago

Bald Head Island Club – Bald Head Island, North Carolina

Jeff
3 months ago

If you ever get to play North Berwick in Scotland, you will see several Light Houses off the coast on the islands around East Lothian, a beautiful course founded in 1832…I could play there everyday for the rest of my life!

ALAN THOMPSON
3 months ago

West Bank Golf Club, East London, South Africa. The course plays around both a lighthouse and a cemetery.
https://th.bing.com/th/id/OIP.xQDoM2RL1Cmc0Z_7FMVtvwHaEo?rs=1&pid=ImgDetMain

Last edited 3 months ago by ALAN THOMPSON
Jeff Necessary
2 months ago

Fortrose and Rosemarkie Golf Club in Scotland, built on a peninsula with a lighthouse way out at the end.

fortrose
Morgan
2 months ago

The lighthouse at Royal Cromer features prominently and is a target off the tee as well for some golfers. It’s also a working lighthouse still and you play to a green that’s a pitch shot away from it.

Tim Troyer
20 days ago

The lighthouse on the Ailsa course is also built on the ruins of Edward the Bruce’s castle.

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