Magdalene Fields Golf Club

Magdalene Fields dates from 1903 and stands as England's northernmost golf course, the first or last course in the country depending on which direction you're travelling. Willie Park Jr laid out the original 18 holes on ground a few minutes' walk from the centre of Berwick-upon-Tweed, and the opening tee sits close to the town's Elizabethan defensive walls. The eighth is a short hole played across a cove, with the cliffs running north into Scotland visible from the tee. The sixteenth, known locally as the Destroyer, is reckoned the hardest hole on the course: a blind tee shot played near a shelter that once featured in a painting by L.S. Lowry. Elsewhere the round takes in views out to Holy Island and along the coast towards the Scottish border. The clubhouse houses the Greens Family Restaurant and stays open through the year for members and visitors. Buggy and trolley hire are both available by the round, and lockers can be rented annually. The club advertises no joining fee and no waiting list for new members. Berwick-upon-Tweed itself changed hands between England and Scotland repeatedly during the medieval period, and the town walls near the first tee are among the fortifications that resulted from that contested history.