Wannamoisett Country Club - Rhode Island, U.S.A.

Wannamoisett Country Club in Rumsford, Rhode Island is one of the most remarkable courses designed by the legendary Donald Ross. Ross is best known for his work at Pinehurst, where he had his headquarters, but some of his finest courses are in Rhode Island, where he spent the summers at Little Compton. Ross was the master of understated elegance and subtle treachery and nowhere is this more evident than at Wannamoisett, completed in 1914. Ross had to wedge the course into a square parcel of 104 acres that lacked much in the way of natural features, and yet the holes are extremely demanding. Forced carries were created through clever routing over gullies and cross-bunkers, and Ross made the most of a pond and a small stream that runs through the property. The slick greens are among Ross's finest and, unlike many of his designs, remain true to the original conception. As Ross himself summed it up: "This is the best layout I ever made; a fine course on 100 acres of land, no congestion, fine variety." Since 1962,  Wannamoisett has hosted the Northeast Amateur, with the list of champions including Ben Crenshaw and David Duval.

Fishers Island Club - New York, U.S.A.

Fishers Island Club is a golfing nirvana on the exclusive summer colony that lies off the Connecticut coast in Long Island Sound. Fishers Island is part of New York, although it is reached by ferry from New London, Connecticut. There is no more charming setting in golf than Fishers Island, with the fairways pirouetting around the western tip of the island overlooking East Harbor out to the sound and across to Block Island. The course itself is a vintage design of Seth Raynor, opened in 1926, with big squared-off plateau greens. Raynor came to golf course architecture working as the engineer for C.B. Macdonald on his design of the National Golf Links. Raynor learned from Macdonald the art of emulating the strategic designs of the great Scottish holes, and he thereafter adopted several of these classics in each of his designs. The fifth at Fishers is a long par-three Biarritz hole, based on the long-lost shot across the chasm at Biarritz in France, with Raynor's version playing to an elevated green across a nook of sandy beach. After Raynor died in January 1926, the course was completed by his assistants, Charles Banks and Ralph Barton.