{"id":3396,"date":"2026-11-02T11:13:21","date_gmt":"2026-11-02T11:13:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/?p=3396"},"modified":"2026-11-02T12:30:10","modified_gmt":"2026-11-02T12:30:10","slug":"203-swanston-18-jun-23","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/?p=3396","title":{"rendered":"203. Swanston. 18 Jun 23."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Treasure Island was written in Braemar. Swanston\u2019s best golf was written on the hill.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Price Paid:<\/strong> \u00a323 (GolfNow, Sunday afternoon)
Current Price (2026):<\/strong> \u00a340 weekday \/ \u00a350 weekend (summer list); \u00a315 \/ \u00a320 (winter list); GolfNow Hot Deals from \u00a317
Value Rating:<\/strong> 4\/5 at \u00a323 paid \/ 4\/5 at current GolfNow \/ 3\/5 at current summer list
Moly\u2019s Score:<\/strong> 82 gross, 36 Stableford points<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
The 12th green, with Edinburgh Castle, St Mary\u2019s three spires and the cranes of Leith on the skyline. This is the view you pay for.<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Swanston sits about four miles south of Edinburgh city centre on the lower slopes of Caerketton Hill. Margaret Carswell, its founder, was a keen golfer who was refused membership by various Edinburgh clubs. Outraged at this, she set up her own ladies-only club here in 1928, and for that deserves a statue. She had spotted the land on a Pentland walk, took a lease, laid out nine holes and extended them to eighteen the following year, advised by her greenkeeper, Herbert More. The 2nd is called More\u2019s Walk. The men were let in soon after!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
Fran appropriately on the 2nd, More\u2019s Walk, named after the greenkeeper who helped Margaret Carswell lay out the original course.<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The club makes a bigger claim. Its history page says a sliced approach at the 1st lands in Robert Louis Stevenson\u2019s garden, and that the adventures of Long John Silver were conceived there. The first part stands. Stevenson\u2019s parents leased Swanston Cottage from 1867 to 1880, and he walked the Pentlands. Sadly, the book claim falls out of bounds. Robert arrived in Braemar on 2 August 1881, where the first fifteen chapters of Treasure Island were written, after drawing a map to amuse his stepson. By then the Swanston lease had ended. Swanston\u2019s real novel is St Ives, which has a chapter titled \u201cSwanston Cottage\u201d. The 10th hole is named St Ives; the scorecard knows its Stevenson story better than the website.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
The 6th, Valley, from the tee. A 200-yard par 3 dropping into a bowl of gorse, and the best hole on the course.<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The front nine is the reason to play. It is moorland golf: gorse, Scots pine, steep slopes and the Caerketton crags overhead. The 6th, Valley, is the pick, a long downhill par 3 into a green framed by bunkers and foxgloves. I made par and felt I\u2019d earned it. The 7th, Shearie Knowe, is 140 yards uphill to a green on a knoll. I took six, having found very deep rough. The 8th, Plateau, is a 231-yard par 4 over the gorse, and I birdied it. Golf is not a fair game. After weeks without rain the fairways were like straw, but the greens were excellent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
The 6th green after a dry spell: crisp stripes on the putting surface, burnt grass everywhere else.<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a>
The 7th, Shearie Knowe, climbing towards Caerketton. A short hole and my only blob of the front nine.<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

On the 13th we met Bharal and Gurung, two Nepalese Gurkha soldiers serving at Redford Barracks. Golf is scarce in Nepal, with only seven courses, and these decent golfers were loving being in Scotland. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
On the 13th with Bharal and Gurung of Redfern Barracks who knew a good front nine when they saw one.<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

So has the Lothianburn merger worked? It was barely a merger. Lothianburn\u2019s membership fell from about 820 to 270 in under a decade, and the club closed in 2013 after 120 years; its clubhouse was its own, but its course had been leased from Swanston Farm, which took the land back. In April 2016 Swanston added two of Lothianburn\u2019s holes, one of them now the 15th, named Lothianburn. Pylons and tree tubes give it a touch of the municipal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
The 15th, Lothianburn, one of two holes taken from the old club in 2016. Pylons overhead, tree tubes alongside, and a long way from the gorse.<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The bigger change came earlier. In 2005 the owner, Colin McClung, hired Ronnie Lumsden and Graeme Tait to replace five holes on the course\u2019s highest slopes. The work put six new holes on 30 hectares of farmland and raised par from 66 to 68. Tait himself admitted the farmland had lost most of its character and offered few features to design around. That is the open, flatter golf I found on the back nine. My instinct holds: the course is weaker than the land allows. But the culprit is not Lothianburn. It is the decision to swap the hill for the field. The 4th, incidentally, is named Gilbert McClung. It is a family farm, and the golf is one of its crops. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
The 8th, Plateau: 231 yards over the gorse to a green on the ridge. A birdie here, straight after a six.<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The farm\u2019s other crops include a range, a par-3 course, footgolf and the Brasserie, opened in 2007. Next door is a small members\u2019 bar that only did pies. It seemed an odd arrangement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Value is simple. At \u00a323 on GolfNow, the front nine alone justified the fee: 4\/5. At \u00a350 for a summer weekend, you are paying full price for nine holes of moorland and nine of farmland: 3\/5. Book a Hot Deal, enjoy the view from the 12th, and save your energy for the 6th.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/a>
The 18th, Swanston Burn, playing towards the converted farm steading that now houses the clubhouse and Brasserie.<\/strong><\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Facts:<\/em>
Course Type:<\/strong><\/em> Moorland (front nine), parkland on former farmland (much of the back nine)<\/em>
Par:<\/strong><\/em> 67 (1 par 5, 11 par 4s, 6 par 3s)<\/em>
Distance:<\/strong><\/em> 5,401 yards (yellow tees)<\/em>
Course Rating \/ Slope:<\/strong><\/em> 66.8 \/ 113<\/em>
Course Quality:<\/strong><\/em> 3.5\/5<\/em>
Moly\u2019s Gross Score:<\/strong><\/em> 82 (36 points)<\/em>
[Scorecard]<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Treasure Island was written in Braemar. Swanston\u2019s best golf was written on the hill. Price Paid: \u00a323 (GolfNow, Sunday afternoon)Current Price (2026): \u00a340 weekday \/ \u00a350 weekend (summer list); \u00a315 \/ \u00a320 (winter list); GolfNow Hot Deals from \u00a317Value Rating: 4\/5 at \u00a323 paid \/ 4\/5 at current GolfNow \/ 3\/5 at current summer listMoly\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17,23,35,46,19,29,32,9,132,54,133,148,13,15,146,31,38,2,18,147,20,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3396","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-18-holes","category-1901-1945","category-3-star","category-4-star-overall-value","category-course-architech","category-course-owned-by","category-course-quality","category-course-type","category-discounts","category-edinburgh-the-lothians","category-golfnow","category-graeme-tait","category-heathland","category-holes","category-margaret-carswell","category-members","category-overall-value","category-price-range","category-region","category-ronnie-lumsden","category-when-course-established","category-40-59","post-preview"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3396","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3396"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3396\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3416,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3396\/revisions\/3416"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3396"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3396"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.scotlandgolfbible.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3396"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}