Royal St David's Golf Club

Royal St David's held its first meeting in November 1894, on a course that Harold Finch-Hatton had laid out with the help of William Henry More across the Morfa Harlech dunes. The Hoylake amateurs John Ball and Harold Hilton were early visitors and put their considerable stamp of approval on it, and royal patronage followed under Edward VII. The setting is among the most spectacular in golf: the links sits directly beneath Harlech Castle — the 13th-century fortress of Edward I's "iron ring" — with Snowdon and the peaks of Snowdonia rising across the estuary to the north and the great dunes to the west.

For all that beauty, the course is best known for its severity relative to its card. At roughly 6,629 yards and par 69 it is widely called the world's most difficult par 69. There are only two par 5s — the 7th and 8th, each reachable in the right conditions, but they run in opposite directions, so the wind that helps one punishes the other. Seven of the par 4s measure between 430 and 470 yards, and two of the par 3s stretch beyond 200. Harry Colt adjusted the bunkering in 1925, but the links remains flat and natural, with few blind shots and subtle greens.

The wind is the examiner. On a still day the numbers are gettable; in a breeze off Tremadog Bay, level par is a genuinely fine round. The 15th is the connoisseur's favourite — a partially blind drive and an approach to a green set among the dunes — while the 8th swings away from the castle into a wilder stretch of duneland.

Harlech town, castle and all, clings to the hillside directly above the course, and for golf of this history and quality the green fee is among the best value of any great British links.