Shifting sands: the old club plays a new course, and the “New” club keeps the old one’s heirlooms.
Price Paid: Nil, as guests of member David Macaulay
Current Price (2026): £210 a round summer (March–October); £110 winter (November–February); not on GolfNow
Value Rating: Price paid n/a / GolfNow n/a / Current list: summer 3.5/5, winter 4/5
Moly’s Score: 86 gross, 34 Stableford points, 32 putts
Top100 Golf Courses ranks Luffness New 45th in Scotland, and recently asked whether an expensive green fee means a better course. Its own figures say not necessarily: the median 2026 summer fee across 94 ranked Scottish courses is £140. The course sits on the A198 between Aberlady and Gullane in East Lothian (historic Haddingtonshire), about 18 miles east of Edinburgh. It’s a private members’ club, and Neil Hardman and I were the guests of David Macaulay, a member of long standing. What a treat. It also meant I paid nothing, so I’ve said so up front, and the ratings reflect it.
Top100 says Luffness New is “probably the oldest ‘new’ golf course in the world, dating back to 1867.” The club’s crest says “18 94”. Both are right, and that’s where it gets interesting.
Most Scottish clubs borrow age. Montrose renamed its championship course “1562” in 2018 (Blog 154), though in 1562 there was no course in that view. Luffness does the opposite. It calls itself New and sits on more history than it lets on.
The 1867 club was Luffness Golf Club, motto “Far and Sure”. That year Henry Walter Hope of Luffness gave Aberlady’s golfers land on the seaward side of the Peffer Burn, and Old Tom Morris laid out 17 holes within a month; an 18th followed in 1872. Maps of that course from 1870 and 1888 hang in Luffness New’s clubhouse.
[1888 map of Luffness Links]
In 1893 the northern holes turned out to be on Gullane land, and Gullane’s owners wanted rent. Hope told the club not to pay and had Morris lay out a new course on his own ground. He called it Luffness Mill, still the name of the 1st hole. In 1894 about half the members went with it, as Luffness New. The rest stayed until the lease ran out in 1898, then accepted the Earl of Wemyss’s offer of land across the bay, and in 1899 became Kilspindie.
That leaves a paradox. The old club, founded in 1867, gave up the Luffness name and moved to a new course. The new club kept the name, part of Old Tom’s ground, the maps, the members’ board and even the hole names. The 1888 map has a Quarry Hole, a Hill Hole, a Well Hole and a Benty Hole. Today’s card has Quarry (6th), Hill (7th), Benty (10th) and Well (13th). Most of the rest of the old links is now the Aberlady Bay Local Nature Reserve, with fragments under Gullane No.2 (Blog 205). And one last twist: Kilspindie’s “new” course takes in the Wanster ground, where Aberlady’s golfers played before 1867, perhaps the oldest golfing ground of the lot.
[Luffness Golf Club members’ board, 1867]
The old club’s members’ board, “Instituted in 1867”. H. W. Hope is President and the Earl of Wemyss Captain: the two landlords at the same table, a couple of years before the members went their separate ways.
So Kilspindie kept the club, and Luffness New kept the heirlooms. Montrose borrows a date it can’t quite justify; Luffness New plays down one it could almost claim. “Custodian” is about the right word. Gullane, Kilspindie and Luffness aren’t three neighbouring stories. They’re one story told on shifting sands, and the landlords have kept them shifting: the Wemyss estate that took in the old club in 1898 built Craigielaw (Blog 182) on land Kilspindie had hoped to use for a second course a century later. The next three blogs tell the rest.
[20230619_111553 – 8th tee panorama]
From the 8th tee, the view the whole story turns on. Old Tom’s links ran along the ground towards the bay; across the water lie Aberlady and Kilspindie, where the old club went. David drives on regardless.
Now the golf. It blew a gale, on a course baked dry. What looks like a vast, open expanse is an illusion: the rough is penal, and the fairways are sometimes little more than a strip. The long par 4s were par 5s for me, and on the 173-yard 3rd David, a low single-figure golfer, took a wood. I spent the day hitting seven- and eight-irons that never rose more than 15 feet. It was honest golf, rewarding thought rather than muscle.
[14th tee – towards Aberlady]
The 14th, “Aberlady”, 504 yards, aimed at the village it’s named after, in the stretch where Luffness New took over Old Tom’s ground. A carry over the wildflowers, a fairway narrowing between the fences and the wind in your face. Luffness in one picture. I took seven.
[20230619_122957 – 13th]
The 13th, “Well”, 379 yards. Three balls, each after two shots, on fairways running like a motorway. None of us reached the green, a low single-figure player included. On a baked links, the wind is the last line of defence.
The bunkering is superb. Revetted pots sit exactly where a decent drive wants to finish, and the point is made straight away.
[1st – bunker line across the fairway]
The 1st, “Luffness Mill”. Welcome to Luffness: six revetted pots strung across the fairway, 300-odd yards from the clubhouse door. No warm-up, no hiding place.
[20261102_121612 – course map]
Today’s routing: the first four holes loop back to the clubhouse before the course heads west across the A198, towards the old links.
The greens are large, subtle and outstanding, and on surfaces this size pace is everything. I three-putted the 2nd but had five single putts and 32 in all. The course is lightly played, and it shows: fairways and tees were immaculate even with trolleys allowed on the tees, as at most Scottish clubs. It’s the same turf as Gullane No.1 (Blog 143), which I called unbeatable.
[20230619_103654 – 4th green]
The 4th green, “Long”, where the opening loop returns to the clubhouse. A vast, firm surface where pace, not line, decides your score.
[9th – fairway to the Forth, SI 1]
The 9th, “Inchkeith”, 407 yards and stroke index 1. Penalty stakes right, rough left, and the Firth of Forth all the way to Arthur’s Seat. Into the wind, a five felt like a birdie.
The clubhouse is a period piece: wood panelling, a log fire, jacket and tie after 9:45am. Shorts are allowed on the course, but only with knee-length socks. My friend Alastair Allanach told me that on a Monday it would be soup and sandwiches. It was a Monday. It was soup and sandwiches. The place feels like a boarding school, in both the best and the oddest sense. It’s not my everyday cup of tea, but I can see why people want it now and again.
Value. I paid nothing, so there’s no honest rating at price paid. The summer rate is £210 a round: £70 above Top100’s Scottish median and rising to £220 next year, though still £115 less than Gullane No.1’s £325 on the same turf. That’s 3.5/5. The winter rate, from 1 November, is £110, below the median for a top-50 links, and that’s where the value is: 4/5. That’s true right along this coast. Early November is when Scottish links golf offers its best value. Winter rates have arrived and the summer crowds have gone, but the ground is still firm and running, and the course is still the course, before winter sets in properly. Go to Luffness in early November, and price and quality line up rather well.
[18th – David and Neil, shared pot bunker]
The 18th, “Home”. David and Neil, close colleagues at work, take teamwork one step too far: two balls, one pot bunker, one hole from the clubhouse. Everyone gets out sideways.
Facts:
Course Type: Links
Par: 70 (2 par 5s, 12 par 4s, 4 par 3s)
Distance: 5,982 yards (white tees)
Course Rating / Slope: 69.5 / 118
Course Quality: 5/5
Moly’s Gross Score: 86
[20261102_115948 – scorecard]
The money shot: my drive from the elevated 8th tee, “March”. Parched June fairways, bunkers lying in wait and open links to the horizon. It looks wide open. Don’t be decieved.
The captains’ board above the clubroom fire. Note the first date: 1894. Lords, a Major, a Reverend and, from 1908, a Hope. Hickories on the panelling, logs by the hearth.
David drives from the 8th. Beyond lie Aberlady Bay and, across the water, Aberlady and Kilspindie, home of the original Luffness club. Old and new in one view.
The routing: the first four holes make a loop back to the clubhouse before the course heads west. Note the A198 cutting through the middle.
The 3rd, “Gullane”, 173 yards, with Gullane Hill behind to explain the name. David is a low single-figure golfer. Into the wind, on a par 3, he took a wood.
The bunkering is superb. Revetted pots sit exactly where a decent drive wants to finish, and they caught us all day, starting on the 1st.
The 1st, “Luffness Mill”, and David has found the first trap of the day. Three more wait up ahead. Every bunker here has a purpose.
The 7th, “Hill”, 271 yards, looks like a birdie chance. Neil found out otherwise. Stacked-turf revetting: proper links bunkers, built to be got out of sideways.
The 4th green, “Long”, where the opening loop brings you back past the clubhouse. A vast, firm surface where pace, not line, decides your score.
The 13th, “Well”, 379 yards. Three approaches, three balls short. Two bunkers squeeze the entrance, and in a gale the running shot is the only option. I took six.
The 11th, “Peffer Bank”, 432 yards. One pot bunker and a very long way to go. Into the wind, a par 5 in all but name.
