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The greatest course in Ireland is also the home of Darren Clarke, the portly Dungannon native who tamed the Tiger in the 2000 World Matchplay event.
Royal Portrush is the only Irish course to host a major championship (the 1951 British Open) and the Senior British Open was played from 1995 until last year. Gary Player won the old fogies event here in 1997 and considers Portrush the finest course he has played - no small endorsement from someone who has logged over two million miles touring the best venues on the planet. A new clubhouse only adds to the Portrush experience.
The Dunluce Links - the championship course here - hugs Northern Ireland's most breathtaking shoreline: the famed Causeway Coast, home of the Giant's Causeway and of the world's oldest whiskey distillery at Bushmills.
From many vantage points on the links you can see Dunluce Castle, a ghostly ruin that still teeters on the cliff edge centuries after a storm washed away the kitchen and a few cooks.
Royal Portrush is as tough and unforgiving a layout as can be found in Ireland: the fairways are narrower than the Rev. Ian Paisley's mind, the rough is chin-high, the greens huge and contoured. Then there are the sand traps, in which one could safely bury a small car. As I clambered into one bunker where my ball plugged, a playing partner sneered, "Don't forget your shovel!"
Portrush includes hazards not indicated on a map of the course. At the par-5 10th hole, two of my partners hit long drives, one in the fairway, the other into a bunker. As we walked off the tee, two large crows swooped down, snatched both balls in their beaks, and were last sighted flying toward Rathlin Island.
"You'll hardly reach the green in two from there," I laughed.
"They would have taken your ball from the rough but they couldn't find it," came the reply.
As befits a great links, Portrush has more memorable holes than you can shake a mashie at, but none more so than the 14th, which is justly known as "Calamity". It's 210 yards over a huge ravine of shoulder-high rough; the average slasher will find the tee shot among the most daunting in Irish golf.
By any yardstick Royal Portrush is a wonderful championship course, and if a welcome on the mat counts for anything, Ireland's best.
Green fees at Royal Portrush are $100. Call +44 126 822311 for reservations.
• Old Head of Kinsale
• The K Club
• Royal Portrush Golf Club