Ekwanok Country Club - Vermont, U.S.A.

Ekwanok Country Club in Manchester is the first and one of the most treasured creations of Walter Travis. When it opened in 1900, it was the first American course that could stand head-to-head with the great courses of the British Isles in the sophistication of its design. Travis took up golf late in life, but won both the u.s. and British Amateur Championships in the early 1900s. Travis had very decided views on course design, which reflected his own abilities as an unerringly straight but not particularly long driver and a crackerjack putter. Ekwanok's narrow fairways careen beneath the broad peaks of the Taconic Mountains and there are large dollops of bunkers protecting the pitched greens. Many of the bunkers have recently been restored to bring them closer to Travis's original intention. After Ekwanok, Travis went on to design a handful other fine courses, such as Garden City and Westchester, but Ekwanok remained the course nearest to his heart. He is buried nearby and the famous Schenectady putter that he used to win the British Amateur in 1904 is displayed in the clubhouse library.

Crumpin-Fox Club - Massachusetts, U.S.A.

Crumpin-Fox Club is located in Bernardston in north central Massachusetts, set in the Pioneer Valley on the eastern edge of the Berkshires. Over 20 years in the making, this public course reached its ultimate fruition through the dedication of three successive owners. The course owes its conception to the late David Berelson, who hired Roger Rulewich, Robert Trent Jones's right-hand man for many years, to locate a site and design the course. Financial considerations forced Berelson to sell the project in 1977 to Bernardston resident Andy St. Hilaire, who completed nine holes. In 1987, he sold the course to his friend Bill Sandri, who acquired additional land enabling Rulewich to complete the other nine, and the course reopened in June 1990. Each hole of Crumpin-Fox is isolated from the others, hewn from the dense forest that makes the course a festival of fall foliage. Ponds and streams figure on several holes, with a large lake running down the entire left side of the signature 592-yard par-five eighth hole. Crumpin-Fox takes its name from the Bernardston-based Crump Soda Company, which was sold in 1853 to Eli Fox, becoming the Crump & Fox Soda Company.