Windermere Golf Club

Windermere Golf Club is at Cleabarrow, above Bowness, on high ground in the middle of the Lake District National Park. The setting is the headline – fell views in every direction from a World Heritage landscape – and it is one of the most enjoyable rounds any junior will play in a season.

The club was founded in 1891 and George Lowe laid out the original nine holes, with the second nine following about eighteen months later. It plays to a par 67 of around 5,150 yards, which makes it the shortest course on the tour, but the numbers tell you very little. This is natural upland ground – rolling and rugged, with heather, bracken, rocky outcrops, narrow fairways, several blind shots and small USGA-specification greens. A golf writer once called it a miniature Gleneagles, not long but very natural and with infinite variety, and that still holds.

Every hole is named after a Lakeland fell or landmark – Helvellyn, Wetherlam, Fairfield, The Old Man, Post Knott – and there are back-to-back par threes at the 14th and 15th. The practice ground runs to 240 yards with target flags, and junior membership includes unlimited golf.