Ben Lowry: Wow for Northern Ireland that we have such stunning golf courses as Royals Co Down and Portrush

Rory McIlroy tees off the 3rd during the Amgen Irish Open 2024 Pro-Am at Royal County Down, Newcastle, County Down. Picture date: Wednesday September 11, 2024. PA Photo. See PA story GOLF Irish. Photo credit should read: Brian Lawless/PA Wire.

RESTRICTIONS: Use subject to restrictions. Editorial use only, no commercial use without prior consent from rights holder.Rory McIlroy tees off the 3rd during the Amgen Irish Open 2024 Pro-Am at Royal County Down, Newcastle, County Down. Picture date: Wednesday September 11, 2024. PA Photo. See PA story GOLF Irish. Photo credit should read: Brian Lawless/PA Wire.

RESTRICTIONS: Use subject to restrictions. Editorial use only, no commercial use without prior consent from rights holder.
Rory McIlroy tees off the 3rd during the Amgen Irish Open 2024 Pro-Am at Royal County Down, Newcastle, County Down. Picture date: Wednesday September 11, 2024. PA Photo. See PA story GOLF Irish. Photo credit should read: Brian Lawless/PA Wire. RESTRICTIONS: Use subject to restrictions. Editorial use only, no commercial use without prior consent from rights holder.
​On Thursday morning I drove down to Royal Co Down for the Irish Open.
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​The drive to Newcastle and the Mourne mountains is always a pleasant one, apart from the fact that much of the route to such a key tourist area really ought to be a dual carriageway rather a single lane road in which you get maddeningly caught behind tractors.

It was sunny and Slieve Donard was towering ahead, the sea beside it – when it came into view – blue.

I have never walked the length of the Royal Co Down course and back, but I did that day, as I followed the superstar NI player Rory McIlroy.

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Aside from being the best golf course in the world, or certainly one of the top three or four, it has a magical feeling. Finely tended, rolling lawns in the forms of fairways and greens, surrounded by prickly shrubbery and bordered by the beautiful Murlough Beach.

You have to walk up and down hills that are, in effect, sand dunes. Golf Digest has long marked it the finest course in the world, saying: “On a clear spring day, with Dundrum Bay to the east, the Mountains of Mourne to the south and gorse-covered dunes in golden bloom, there is no lovelier place in golf.”

Next year the (British) Open will be held at Royal Portrush, typically considered in or around the 10 best courses on Earth.

Wow for Northern Ireland!

Ben Lowry (@BenLowry2) is News Letter editor