Carpe Cape Breton

Take a spectacular golf trip to “New Scotland” without leaving North America.

National

“Nova Scotia” is Latin for “New Scotland,” and as a golfer, that may be all you need to know. Sure, it’s still a hefty trip to Cape Breton, the gold mine of golf in the maritime province; from Minneapolis, it’s about an eight-hour plane trip, two days by train, or a 37-hour drive. But that’s still about 2,000 miles closer than old Scotland.

Cape Breton should be on any golfer’s bucket list of destinations. Three must-play golf courses alone make it worth the trip—Cabot Cliffs, Cabot Links and Highland Links—but happily, there’s still more to relish in terms of golf, scenery, and a suitably Gaelic vibe.

In late September, Nova Scotia and Cape Breton were hit hard by the high winds and flooding rains of Hurricane Fiona. Parts of the famed Cabot Trail were washed away and many holes at Highland Links were under water once Fiona passed through. But the golf season rarely extends past mid-October and tends to open in mid-May, so planning now for next spring or summer will be no problem.

Cabot Links and Cabot Cliffs
First, there’s Cabot Cape Breton, the resort that solidified the area as a desirable golf locale when the first 10 holes of the Cabot Links course opened in July 2011. When the Cabot Cliffs course debuted in June 2016, desire was upgraded to lust.

When the Cabot founder and executive chairman Ben Cowan-Dewar had the notion of bringing golf to the former coal mining town of Inverness, he also had enough conviction that he persuaded Mike Keiser to be a co-founder. That’s Mike Keiser as in Bandon Dunes. When Keiser brought his Bandon Dunes playbook along (links or links-style golf, walking only, attractive accommodations, more than one course and so on), success was virtually assured.

Speaking of books, the full story of Cabot and other Keiser golf properties is told in the recent volume by Keiser with Stephen Goodwin titled, “The Nature of the Game: Links Golf at Bandon Dunes and Far Beyond.”

Spectacular settings help. Cowan-Dewer tapped fellow Canadian Ron Whitman to design Cabot Links, and he didn’t disappoint. The course wends attractively from the town to the sea in classic land-hugging links golf; it would be a pleasure to walk even if you didn’t have the sticks in hand. But there’s plenty of golfing challenge to entice as well.

The response to Cabot Links was positive from the start, before there were even any accommodations on hand. (Now, there are 72 contemporary lodge rooms and a variety of luxury golf villas and homes, as well as three restaurants.) But when the Bill Coore-Ben Crenshaw-designed Cabot Cliffs opened up, rapture has been the usual gob-smacking response.

If Cabot Links lies close to the sea, Cabot Cliffs indeed rises high above it, with settings so spectacular your camera will be as vital a piece of equipment as your clubs. Now routinely named as the best course in Canada, it has been steadily climbing in ranking lists as one of the best in the world.

The routing is as startling as the setting, with six par-5s, six par-4s and six par-3s, nary a dull hole in sight.

As if these two courses weren’t enough, now there’s The Nest at the resort, a 1,300-yard 10-hole par-3 routing by Ron Whitman and Dave Axland, created at one of the highest points on the Cliffs property, and thereby affording even more stunning ocean views.
Hitting the Highland Links

Highland Links is about 2.5 hours away from Cabot, and it’s worth a visit for at least two reasons: the drive to the course, and the drives at the course. It’s located in Cape Breton Highlands National Park in Ingonish, and to get there you’ll wind up on the Cabot Trail. That’s a good place to be.

Completed in 1932, the 185-mile roadway loops over the northern tip of the island. Some of the Cape Breton marketing slogans—“There’s no wrong turn,” and “Where the mountains meet the sea”—are fully justified here by the consistently scenic splendor. You could plan a vacation simply around driving the Trail with stops along the way, with the only (unanswerable) debate being: “Do you take it clockwise or counter-clockwise?”

On the other side of the country, the drive from Jasper to Banff is another world-altering ride. Clearly, in the Great Scenic Drive category, Canada is nonpareil. And like those great tracks in the west, Highland Links is the creation of the late great Stanley Thompson, considered one of the nation’s matchless course designers.

Now an octogenarian site, having opened in 1941, Highland Links almost borrows the Cape Breton slogan, as Thompson considered it his “mountains and ocean” course. It had been tinkered with over the years and conditioning was sometimes known to be spotty. But a restoration of Thompson’s original bunkering and improved maintenance has kept his routing strong, making full use of the bold contours and backdrops of its locale within the national park.

It’s an up-and-down trip; hilly ground descends toward the waters and then rises again, with rarely a level lie on hand. The greens are equally devilish in their movement. A round here is like a quest and a tussle with historic golf architecture, which may require rest and replenishment at the nearby Keltic Lodge.

Exploring Cape Breton
And assuming (perhaps incorrectly) that golfers can’t live by golf alone, try to sneak in some local flavor. Track down a traditional Cape Breton lobster feed, which does away with plates altogether by tossing lobsters onto a table covered in newspapers and then digging in with abandon.

It’s said there are more fiddlers in Cape Breton than anywhere in the world, so it’s not hard to find a ceilidh (traditional Scottish gathering) tuning up in the evenings somewhere on the island. Ponder a visit to the Glenora Distillery in Mabou, the first single malt distillery established in North America. Or wet your whistle at Big Spruce Brewing in Baddeck, or the Breton Brewing Co. in Sydney. Cider heads can check in at the Island Folk Cider House, also in Sydney.

Then there are meat darts. For a small entry fee at the legion hall or local bar on meat dart nights, contestants can vie for prizes that range from lowly bologna (okay, that’s usually for last place) to more desirable moose steaks or loin of veal. If you wash out, just order a Donair Pizza (look it up) and call it a night.

No wrong turns.