Brancepeth Castle Golf Club

Brancepeth Castle Golf Club is laid out over the old deer park of Brancepeth Castle, four miles south-west of Durham City on the A690 towards Crook. The clubhouse is the castle’s converted stables and coach house, and the opening holes look across to the castle itself and to St Brandon’s Church beside it.

The course was designed in 1924 by Harry Colt, working with J. S. F. Morrison, and has never been significantly altered. It plays to a par 70 of around 6,400 yards from the back tees over a wooded plateau, and its defining feature is a deep ravine that cuts straight through the property and comes into play on several holes. The best known is the 9th, a par three of roughly 200 yards played across the ravine to a fast, sloping green, with the 10th another par three immediately after it.

The mature deciduous trees are one of the pleasures of a round here – the silver birches on the 1st fairway and at the 18th green were planted for the Queen’s Silver Jubilee. The club has a growing junior section with a low-cost academy grade as the way in.