June 2024 issue of Home on the Course

Scotland Golf Trip: How to Save Enough
to Pay for Airfare (and for shipping your clubs)

Major golf tour operators do a good job of taking care of their clients, providing what businesses in the United Kingdom call a bespoke experience. (Definition of bespoke: “Specially made for a particular person.”) But those “particular persons” do not include golfers looking for the best experience at the lowest possible price. For them, the do-it-yourself approach can provide the same great golf and even more flexibility than a pre-planned golfing vacation, and at a much lower price.

Golf tour operators, obviously and justifiably, must mark up all the costs of the tour and bundle them into one package fee.  That, of course, is how they make their money.  Those include golf fees, lodgings, some meals (if included in the package) and transportation.  Yet by spending just an hour or two on the Internet, a golfer looking to save hundreds of dollars – potentially thousands – can build essentially the same itinerary for themselves, whether they are traveling alone, with a partner or in a foursome. And they can avoid the cost of a rented car and the safety issues related to “driving on the wrong side of the road” and a steering wheel on the wrong side of the car.  (I know the safety issues all too well; see below.)

The 13th green at the Crail Balcomie Links, an old boathouse and North Sea beyond. The gorse bush may look innocent, but it is death to golf balls.

I have always wondered about the cost differential between the packaged tours and the annual vacation I build for myself.  Because I travel every May to the village of Crail on the east coast of Scotland, I will use, as an example, a golf vacation centered there – just nine miles from St. Andrews – to illustrate just how much you could save building your own personal golf itinerary. (I have converted pound sterling rates to US dollars.)

The Crail Golfing Society comprises two splendid linksland courses:  The 130-year-old Balcomie Course, designed by the famed Old Tom Morris, and the Craighead Course (circa 1998), the first international design by the celebrated Gil Hanse.  The 36 holes of golf at Crail each provide a peek at the North Sea; few other two-course combos in the world can boast ocean views from every hole. 

In my experience, the best prices and most comfortable lodgings in Crail can be found via VRBO (Vacation Rentals by Owner) or Airbnb.  Those who stay in Crail have a choice of 20 courses within a half hour, seven courses alone within the St. Andrews Links group, more than you could play in two weeks. (Note: If you are dedicated to playing the Old Course during your trip, you will need to put in for the lottery draw two days before you intend to play.  You can do that online.  The Crail Golfing Society is accommodating about releasing you without penalty from your advanced tee time should your ballot be picked for the Old Course.)

This Airbnb rental features three bedrooms and three baths and is within a few steps of the first tees on the two Crail Golfing Society courses.

I have had tremendously good luck in the middle of May with the typically erratic Scottish weather; therefore, I am basing my price comparisons on the week of May 10 to 17, 2025. (I have converted pounds sterling to dollars.) The current rate for that week in an Airbnb cottage adjacent to the Crail golf courses, and with views out to the North Sea, is $1,825 ($265 per night), including cleaning fee, according to the Airbnb website. The home comprises three bedrooms and three baths and, therefore, would be suitable for a foursome that includes two couples; two of the three bedrooms boast king-sized beds and the other bunk beds. Split four ways, lodging for the week would be $464 each, or $77 per night (making it reasonable for just the two couples).  Try that at any Holiday Inn.  (Note:  If you are traveling as a single or a couple, there are many options in the fishing village of Crail, less than two miles from the golf courses, but transportation to the courses will be extra, yet modest.)

Crail Golfing Society is offering a discounted play-both-courses rate in 2024 of $281 per person, a savings of $77 over the rack rate for both courses if booked separately.  You have up to five days after playing the first course to play the second. The same package should be available in 2025, maybe at slightly higher rates. Given my experience, I suggest playing each of the Crail courses twice during your visit; they are loads of fun but a bit capricious in terms of conditions.  One day you might play them in wind and fog, the next in bright sunshine and little wind.  Typical Scotland.

Before moving on to Crail, you might consider a couple of days in Edinburgh, one of the world’s most fascinating cities and home to a famous castle. I always make sure I stay there for two or three nights in a comfortable local hotel, not the castle.

For the sake of costing out the trip, I am going to assume that my mythical golfers will put in for the lottery at the Old Course and will get lucky. (If you lose out one day, you can try again the next.)  The current rack rate for the Old Course is $408.  St. Andrews offers more reasonable prices for their other six courses, and committing to more than one will save some money.  Other excellent courses outside St. Andrews but within a 30-minute drive of Crail include Lundin, Elie and the newest one, Dumbarnie Links, the most expensive of the three.  (Note: Taxi companies based in St. Andrews might assess a “call out” fee for taking clients to golf courses that are outside the St. Andrews to Crail corridor.) 

Of course, you will need transportation to all those golf courses – as well as to restaurants, shopping and for any sightseeing. For those who want to rent a car and drive in Scotland, I wish you good luck and provide you with a quick cautionary tale.  I was never comfortable renting a car with a steering wheel on the right side, but I did it for my first four visits to Scotland. I have a good driving record in the States but having to drive on the “wrong” side of the road always caused me driving dyslexia.  The experience was exhausting especially through narrow coastal roads where, two years ago, I miscalculated the distance between my rental car and a truck parked on the side of the narrow road.  Long story short, I sheared off the truck’s side view mirror, stopped and waited for its burly driver to stomp up to my car and yell every curse word I had ever heard, and some utterly new ones.  That trip was the last time I drove in the UK.

I wish I had quit driving there sooner.  Today I rely on St. Andrews Taxi Company to take me wherever I need to go, and I probably don’t pay more over a week’s time than I would for the rental car.  The service is operated by a married couple, James and Linda, who started small a few years ago with one yellow taxi, James’ nod to the TV show Taxi, his favorite boyhood comedy series. 

A couple of years ago James and Linda purchased the 30-year-old St. Andrews Taxi Company and expanded substantially its fleet of cars.  They offer their clients a range of options at reasonable prices, and whether you are in a large group or just a single, they will match your needs to their cars and luxury vans.  Last year, Linda took my wife Connie and me on a six-hour tour of the countryside that included a stop at Blair Atholl, a castle filled with a wild assortment of antlers, armor and armaments – hundreds of muskets affixed to the walls in unusually mesmerizing arrangements. In short, James and Linda can do everything from shuttle you to and from local golf courses to design a daylong tour for you.  That sounds bespoke to me.

 If you want an interesting respite from golf, ask St. Andrews Taxi to take you to and from Blair Atholl in Pitlochry, a fascinating castle filled with armor, armaments and scores of antlers lining the hallways and hanging from the ceilings.

One other positive about leaving the driving to others: Scotland is the home of one of the most famous liquids in the world.  Whiskey bars and distilleries are everywhere in the country, and even if you intend to have what the Scots call a “wee dram,” arrange for a ride back to where you are staying.  Scottish drunk driving laws are among the toughest in the world, and the advice from Scottish police is worth taking: “Avoid alcohol altogether if you plan to drive.”  Buy a bottle and drink at home or, if you plan to drink at a bar or restaurant, call a cab. (Note:  At the ends of tours, most distilleries offer “driver packages” for consumption at home.)

On my recent trip, a roundtrip from Crail to St. Andrews cost me $89. (The company lists prices between St. Andrews and the top golf courses in the area at standrewstaxis.com.) Round trips from Crail to the courses between Crail and St. Andrews would cost a little less; rides to the courses along the coast south of Crail (Leven, Lundin, Elie) would be a bit more.  Assuming four rounds at Crail and three others in the area, plus a couple of dinners in area restaurants – say, seven roundtrips in all – I estimate a taxi transportation bill of $500 for the week, give or take.  (Note: You shouldn’t need transportation for your lunches as you will probably eat in the clubhouses where you play; the Crail clubhouse serves dinner and the Airbnb home next to the golf course has cooking facilities as well; the butcher in Crail is an excellent source for fine cuts of meat and excellent meat pies at surprisingly reasonable prices, and the food co-op across the street can supply other food needs. The Crail clubhouse dining room, by the way, overlooks the North Sea and the last four holes on the Balcomie Links. (It is extra fun to watch the gannets dive into the ocean to snag fish.)

If I add up the cost of a do-it-yourself golf vacation in Crail and St. Andrews (see chart below), I come up with an estimated seven days of golf at $225 each day, or $1,575 (a bit more if you are successful at the Old Course ballot box); lodging at the aforementioned $1,856 – $464 if you are part of a foursome – with the added convenience of being a short walk to the clubhouse and first tee at Crail Golfing Society; and taxi transportation at the estimate of $500.  (Note: These transport costs do not include transfers from the Edinburgh airport, 70 miles away (see below). You have a couple of options. If you require transfers between the airport and Crail, St. Andrews Taxi can provide that at $200 each way.  Alternately, I have taken a bus from the Edinburgh airport to Waverley Station in the city (about 20 minutes and less than $10) from where you can take a reasonably priced one-hour train ride to Leuchars, outside St. Andrews, and then get a reasonably priced St. Andrews Taxi ride to Crail for about $40.)

It isn’t easy to find golf tour operators’ package pricing online for golf vacations in the St. Andrews area. I found one operator that is offering a choice of courses that include St. Andrews Old Course, other St, Andrews courses and the Balcomie course at Crail, at package prices starting at £5,065, or $6,357 for a week.  I noted four-day packages priced well over half of that amount.  The total for your self-generated itinerary, aside from meals, should be about $1,575 for the golf; plus $1,856 for the lodgings if you are alone or a couple, or $464 if you are part of a foursome; and $500 for the taxi rides – for a total of about $4,000 if you are travelling alone, or $2,518 if you are in a foursome, about $3,000 less than for the typical pre-arranged packaged vacation.  (See chart of costs below.) By investing about two hours online, you could pay for your roundtrip airfare from the U.S. – maybe even move up to business class -- by making your own Scottish travel arrangements. 

Either way, bespoke or be thrifty, if you are a serious golfer, you will have a seriously good time in Scotland.

A Few More Ways to Improve Your Scottish Golf Vacation

If you are used to staying in U.S. hotels and rented homes, you might find your stay in Scotland to be a little quirky.  On my recent golf vacation and driving tour of the Highlands with my British brother-in-law at the wheel – personally arranged, of course – I stayed in a total of three hotels and one VRBO home.  Not one included a bar of soap – although all provided liquid soap and shampoo – and only one included anything resembling a washcloth. (That one was marked “Makeup Remover.”) I brought a bar of soap from the States but not a washcloth.  I will remedy that next year.

The restaurant food has gotten much better over the 15 years I have traveled to Scotland, although there is one restaurant staple that is almost universally badly executed – the hamburger.  I tried it three times over my 10 days in the country; the one in the Crail Golfing Society clubhouse was pretty good, but the other two I ate during my Highlands tour were wildly overcooked and the meat compressed to the point of a solid mass. That said, my meals at the Kinneuchar Inn, 20 minutes from Crail, and The Shoregate in Crail, were terrific, if a bit pricey.  The menu in the Crail clubhouse is rather limited but the food competently prepared.  I especially love the freshly baked scones with my morning coffee.

If you need a day of rest from golf and are staying in Crail, call St. Andrews Taxi on the Sunday of your visit and ask them to drop you at The Old Course in St. Andrews.  On Sundays, the course is closed to play and the townspeople and visitors are invited to walk the entire course in any directions they want.  It is the highest form of community activity you will ever find; and if you love dogs – the Scots certainly do – you will see dozens of different breeds walking with their owners.  Stop to take a selfie on the famed Swilken Bridge or have someone take your photo as you mimic Arnold Palmer’s final wave from the bridge. You could spend an easy two or three hours walking the streets of St. Andrews beyond the Old Course.  Weather permitting, don’t miss a stroll through St. Andrews University, whose campus is one of the most beautiful – and historic – in the world.  (Note: I booked a table for one at Forgan’s, a trendy restaurant in town, and enjoyed my “Sunday Roast” dinner of roast beef and all the trimmings.)

For the past three years, I have shipped my golf clubs to and from my home in Connecticut to the Crail Golfing Society using the golf club shipping service ShipSticks.  ShipSticks promises delivery within five business days; yet, consistently over the last three years, my clubs have arrived in Crail and then back home in three days maximum, safe and sound.  For about $225 each way, the thought of not having to drag my clubs through airports and hoisting them into taxis and vans is worth the cost…especially if I am saving so much money by making my own arrangements.

One last bit of advice:  When you are making a reference to the citizens of the country you are visiting, do not use the adjective “Scotch.” As I have heard them rebuke others, most of the time gently, they are “Scottish” in the adjectival sense and Scots in the noun sense.  Scotch is the national drink of which they are immensely proud, and justifiably so.  (My brother-in-law, Martin, and I toured the Highlands distillery of Glengoyne on this trip, and I recommend it to anyone with even just a passing interest in the way Scotch is made.)

In the feature above, I have hyperlinked to the websites of all golf courses, restaurants and other locations of note.  For convenience, they are listed below as well. If you have any questions about a Scottish golf vacation, please email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and I will respond in short order. 

Slainte Mhath*

*Scottish for “to your health” and pronounced slan-cha-va.

Links for the services in the articles above

Crail Golfing Society, Balcomie and Craighead courses:  https://crailgolfingsociety.co.uk/

St. Andrews Trust Links:  https://standrews.com/homepage/

Airbnb Crail:  https://www.airbnb.com/crail-united-kingdom/stays/houses

Online Ballot for The Old Course:  https://standrews.com/old-course-ballot

Lundin Golf Club:  https://www.lundingolfclub.co.uk/

Elie Golf Club: https://www.golfhouseclub.co.uk/

Dumbarnie Links:  https://www.dumbarnielinks.com/

St. Andrews Taxi Company:  https://standrewstaxis.com/

Kinneuchar Inn:  https://www.kinneucharinn.com/

The Shoregate restaurant:  https://theshoregate.com/

Forgan’s restaurant:  https://www.forgans.co.uk/

ShipSticks:  https://www.shipsticks.com/

Your Personally Arranged Scottish Golf Vacation: Chart of Costs

The chart below includes costs for one week of lodging in Crail, Scotland, seven rounds of golf and taxi transportation to and from golf, dinner/shopping and airport. It indicates the costs for both a single/couple and a foursome.  It does not include the costs of food and incidentals. Prices are based on costs in May 2024 and could change. Depending on choices, you will save a few thousand dollars building your own vacation.

*Other golf courses within half hour of Crail include Kingsbarns, the Torrance and Kittocks courses at the Fairmont Resort, Ladybank, Lundin Links, Leven Links and all the courses in the St. Andrews Links group, including the New Course, Eden and five others.

Thanks for reading,
Larry Gavrich
Founder & Editor
Home On The Course, LLC