- Follow us on:
From our Directory of the most recommended golf courses
Carne Golf Links
Revise Course Description
Pace of Play
Greens
Service
Value
Design/Layout
Located in County Mayo, western Ireland Carne Golf Links was designed by Eddie Hackett and is routed through sand dunes overlooking Blacksod Bay and the Atlantic Ocean near Belmullet. It compares favorably to the landscapes of the great Ireland links courses, County Down, European Club, and even Ballybunion, but doesn't possess the pedigree. The land is rolling and tumbling linksland with greens on natural plateaus or coves, untouched by the architect's hands, in a fully natural setting....all 18 holes!! It's not an out and in layout, so the winds plays differently on a number of the hole routings, with the huge dunes at some points providing shelter. Accuracy is the key here, distance is generally not rewarded, this is a thinking man's course that builds, hole after hole and becomes a supreme challenge on the back side. Other courses in the general area that should be included in a trip to May would be County Sligo, Enniscrone, and Connemara.
Posted by: JayM
Oct 9th, 2011
No matter how carefully we police the collection of Top 50 data, shills for certain courses keep trying to influence the ratings. Carneivores share recipes in the Eddie Hackett Lounge. And now a once-respected Texas journalist has turned to the dark side, wielding recipes in a sad effort to dislodge Askernish Old from the top spot. His name is Bruce Selcraig*, and his byline appears in all the top magazines. But he moonlights as a golf-course critic. If you’ve got a coastal property bigger than a fairground with dunes on it, Bruce has probably photographed it. If it isn’t fenced, he’s probably played it. *Full disclosure: He’s a friend. Anyway, Bruce is an admirer of the Carne Golf Links of Belmullet, Ireland. (As are we. Carne has held the number-two spot since the Top 50’s inception.) He plays there so often that he’s on a first-name basis with the clubhouse and greenkeeping staff and with many members of the Belmullet Golf Club. It is Bruce’s practice, after a round at Carne, to send us an unsolicited report on the course’s myriad charms, leaning heavily on exclamation points and adjectives such as “dazzling,” “tear-inducing,” and “unparalleled.” On Tuesday, however, he sent this: “I got rained and winded out of Carne this time, but had a hot chowder with Eamon [Mangan]. I have written him just now, but do you happen to know the recipe or main ingredient of [Carne’s] chowder, which I like far more than the milky white stuff at many courses.” Stymied by his syntax, he added: “???” Recognizing this as a variant of the “milkshake ploy” — as in, “Castle Pines is the best course west of the Mississippi because of their amazing milkshakes” — I wrote Bruce back, explaining that my usual lunch at Carne was the tasty vegetable soup and brown bread. He exploded. “You have NOT had the chowder? You elongated girly man from dubious BBQ territory!” Still working the food theme, Bruce provided a link to his freshly-written PostGame blog about The European Club (No. 8) in County Wicklow, which led off with the news flash that he had liked the salmon-and-prawn salad at Jack White’s Lounge & Restaurant. Today, he raised the ante, writing, “This just in from Eamon … good luck,” followed by a document titled Blacksod Bay Seafood Chowder Recipe. The recipe began, “Make fish stock from shellfish shells & white fish bones, e.g. monkfish, cod, etc. Don’t use oily fish. Sweat off 1 diced onion, one head celery, 3 leeks chopped, 2 diced carrots …. And that’s as much as I’ll share, because the recipe was signed by Carne’s head chef (and 2005 Irish Chef of the Year) John Conmy, and I’d rather not have to defend a recipe-infringement suit. Selcraig knows that. He sent the recipe because he thinks it will tip the clubhouse-food metric in Carne’s favor and put the Mayo links ahead of Scotland’s Askernish. To which I publicly say: “No way.” The Top 50 algorithm treats unsolicited course evaluations as corrupted data —at least until the best minds at Cal Sci figure out how to digitize monkfish-bone scores. So Carne, even if it rules the chowder rankings, is still the runner-up among courses. As for that BBQ crack, Bruce knows that Kansas City holds six of the top ten spots in the latest World Barbecue Ranking, while Texas’ top joint limps in at No. 14. And that’s a fact. Top 50 on TV: They’ve had record crowds this week at the Frys.com Open, thanks to the Top 50. The host venue, the CordeValle Resort Golf Club, debuted at No. 50 in June of 2010, and has since soared to the 49th spot. Lured by our reports of oak-studded foothills, sprawling vineyards and soaring sycamores, Tiger Woods made a rare fall appearance. Was he impressed? Can’t say, but he decided to stay for the weekend. Visit John Garrity's Top 50
Flag Content
Posted by: LNewsome
Sep 30th, 2010
Very enjoybale course with some nice scenery on the back nine. The greens lacked any real character as they were generally flat. This was in contrast to the dunes that you were playing in and around which were quite large. #12, a short, sharp dogleg left, seemed to be a love it or hate it hole. Anything from a driver to a 6 iron could be played from the tee leaving a variety of shots to the green. The drive was downhill and the second shot was to a benched green some 30 feet above the bottom of the fairway. The love or hate it part came because none of us could ever figure out how to hit the green in regulation. #16 was a nice drop shot par 3 that was fun to play in a moderately strong cross wind. #17 was definitely the hardest hole. A resonably long par 4 that played uphill all the way. Left of the fairway put you in large valley with no hope of making par. Second shot had a large valley to the right of the green but a nice bank on the left to be used to bank the ball on to the green.
Flag Content
Posted by: kevinmarkham
Jul 31st, 2009
The most outstanding experience you will ever have - the course starts slowly enough, but when you hit the back 9 there are several holes that simply take your breath away. Value for money is unbelievably good, and it is so far from anywhere and so mountainous (and often blind) that you have to play it at least twice
Flag Content
Posted by:
Oct 14th, 2008
This is an extraordinary and terrific course and one that way too few visitors reach. It is extremely remote, on the wild Belmullet peninsula in Mayo, and has really made the most of its location. Building the course barely changed the terrain, instead it insinuated itself between hillocks and dunes to create natural hazards and a fascinating twisting course.