Thursday. 8th October 2026

Golfing at Swords

Enjoyed the first lay in, if you call 730 a lay in, in preparation for our challenge of the Swords Open course.

A circumspect breakfast for a day of what lay ahead of us on our first foray into Irish golf.

Arrived rugged up at the Pro Shop around 1015 in weather that according to BOM felt like 7 with rain forecast for around 3. A very obliging Pro Shop worker had us kitted out with pretty flash new Taylormade Clubs, new bags and a couple of sleeves of balls.

Got an earlier start than scheduled and wandered down to practice putting green where we asked where the sand buckets were. That earned a quizzical look and a ‘we don’t fix divots here the staff do that’. Well that’s one distraction we didn’t need to worry about.

The greens were immaculate and extremely fast. The grass on fairways was lush and good lies were assured if tou stayed in fairways.

I quickly dipped into the ball stocks losing one in the light rough on the first hole. Remarkably the open nature of course meant it was the only lost ball between us.

The fairways are cut continuously by little green rbpt mowers who seem to follow you around, they present great quality fairways and even have rules specifically written if you hit one or they run over your ball.

The course was pretty forgiving with wide fairways, but the fluffy fairway lies meant no run. Many of the Par 3 holes were quite short whereas the 4 and 5’s were long by Massey Park standards.

We managed to get 9 holes in before the rain arrived and the last 9 were played in wet weather gear. The bunkers are unforgiving with one trapping Jane and having her swinging wildly for a long time before hitting out sideways- partners coaching tips were not well received after the first 4 swipes. Thankfully I only had one shot in a fairway bunker.

The course was reasonably full on a competition day but we moved along steadily managing to finish first 9 in 1.75 hours.

The back 9 was a little tougher but we still managed to finish in 3.75 hours, unlike a few locals who called it a day after 12 when the rain picked up.

We didn’t break any records with our scores, but it was enjoyable and a good warm up for tomorrow’s early round on the Championship course which hosts national and international events. It’s likely we might put a dent in ball stocks over there.

Dropped off the gear, dried off and had a late lunch in the clubhouse, with about 6 people. It’s amazing how few members play and support the club, especially when the two have more than 1400 members combined.

A bit of a lazy afternoon planning how to fit a game of golf in and get to the airport to fly to Malta, especially given we are likely to be drowned rats if the forecast 7mm of rain and 70kph winds arrive.

A very light dinner and couple of drinks before heading back to prepare our bags for tomorrow. That ended avert but enjoyable day here at Swords.