Top 100 courses under £100: 50-41

50 – Machrihanish Dunes, Argyll & Bute
2013 green fee: £70

The new (McLay) Kidd in town is Mach Dunes, just a few years old and next to the original Machrihanish. It’s fantastic, and is getting better with every year.

Why it’s special: This is completely natural seaside golf, dictated by the often wild pitches and rolls of the land 

49 – Moray Old, Moray
2013 green fee: £70

A glorious links course in the best traditions that begins and ends in the lovely seaside town of Lossiemouth. On the front nine the fairways are lined by gorse while there is more space on the way home.

Why it’s special: Playing up the last fairway towards the grand old clubhouse is so memorable

48 – Royal Ashdown Forest (Old), Sussex
2013 green fee: £65

Famously without a single bunker, Ashdown Forest is certainly not lacking in protection with grassy hollows particularly effective in costing you half a shot without you realising it. The second course here is almost every bit as good.                               

Why it’s special: The highlight is surely the view from the 11th tee 

47 – Glasgow Gailes Links, Ayrshire
2013 green fee: £95

Gailes will be Scotland’s host of final Open qualifying for the next few years and it is nice to see this august links emerge from the shadows and take its deserved share of the attention that the classic Ayrshire courses receive.

Why it’s special: You don’t often see heather on a links course

46 – Panmure, Angus
2013 green fee: £75

Panmure is classy, well-presented and packed with fine holes. Work is currently underway to move a couple of fairways further away from a caravan park and this will only add to the experience.

Why it’s special: Taking aim at the raised, well-protected green on the 6th, named after Ben Hogan, is quite a challenge
There are suprisingly few top-class inland courses in Scotland but Blairgowrie assuredly has two of them. 45 – Seacroft, Lincolnshire
2013 green fee: £40

Not too many golfers would think immediately of Skegness when it came to an east-coast golfing trip but those who make it here love Seacroft. It’s a links course of real substance that quickly opens out as you play away from the town over the opening holes. 

Why it’s special: The quartet of par 3s offers a bit of everything

44 – Beau Desert, Staffordshire
2013 green fee: £70

There is a special – if unlikely to those who don’t know better – golf trip to be enjoyed in Staffordshire and the highlight may well be Beau Desert. Herbert Fowler’s pine-clad heathland masterpiece lies in glorious seclusion.                   

Why it’s special: Firm, sloping fairways demand a cunning game plan

43 – Dunbar, East Lothian
2013 green fee: £65

The first of the great East Lothian courses you encounter if approaching from the south-east, Dunbar does not begin in great style but quickly picks up the pace. It’s a course that occupies a long, narrow piece of land – there’s just enough room for a vintage links. 

Why it’s special: You get very, very close to the sea here

42 – New Zealand, Surrey
2013 green fee: £85

Perhaps the least known of Surrey’s great heathlands, and one senses that is just the way the club and its members like it. At around 6,000 yards and entirely flat, it is as easy-walking and relaxing an experience as golf can provide. 

Why it’s special: Playing here feels like discovering a secret course nobody else that has visited

41 – Blairgowrie (Rosemount), Perthshire
2013 green fee: £60

There are suprisingly few top-class inland courses in Scotland but Blairgowrie assuredly has two of them. The better known is the Rosemount, where many of the fairways are lined by trees and heather is a recurring hazard.  

Why it’s special: The turf is delightfully springy here

CLICK HERE to find out who made it to number 40-31 in our list…