http://frescohealth.com/mind-over-matter/ A terrific guide to golf in Scotland is Golf in Scotland, by Allan McAllister Ferguson, a personal travel planner. The fourth edition has just been published. If you’re going to Scotland, or if you dream of going to Scotland, you need a copy. You should also get sign up for Ferguson’s newsletter.

http://sjfiremuseum.org/portfolio/category/historical-photos/ I took a golf trip to Scotland in 2008 with eight friends from home. Our best lodgings were in St. Andrews, where we spent two nights in a nineteenth-century house on North Street, a short walk from the Old Course. The house, which was designed by the same man who designed the main part of the R. & A. clubhouse, was recommended to me by Ferguson. It had five double bedrooms, and it came stocked with orange juice and candy bars, and there was a gas grill and a lighted artificial putting green in the backyard. And it set us back just $70 per man per night. If we’d known how cool it was going to be, we might have thrown out our itinerary and stayed there the whole time. Here’s a photo of the backyard:

This is how you're supposed to spend the evening after you've played 36 holes on the Old Course.

Unfortunately, the house doesn’t seem to be available at the moment. Ferguson told me he thinks it may be closed for good, but the house’s website is tantalizing. (It also has more pictures.) You might also try sending a begging email to the owner, Stuart Lloyd, who is an English urologist and an R & A member. (The address is on the website.)

Lloyd loves golf more than you do. He and his wife, who is also a doctor, live in Leeds, five hours away, but they spend a lot of time in St. Andrews. They also own a second house there, and in the backyard of that one Stuart built a three-quarter-scale replica of the Road Hole bunker:

If you can’t talk Lloyd into putting you up in St. Andrews, Ferguson has other suggestions—some of which he saves for his newsletter.