Golf Central

American property tycoon Donald Trump has moved a step closer to gaining permission to build a $1 billion golf complex on one of Scotland’s most picturesque coastlines. In the first round campaign the local planning committee voted 7-4 in favour of Trump to the dismay of fellow corporate big guns, the RSPB and Scottish National Heritage.

Trump says he plans to build "the greatest golf course on earth," a proposed complex which will include two championship courses, almost 1000 holiday homes, 500 private houses and an eight-storey hotel. It will flatten 60 acres of beautiful Aberdeenshire seaside that is home to an array of wildlife and a unique sand-dune system. The dunes are constantly shifted by winds of a similar power used to create Trump's improbable hairstyle.

For more on Trump's grand ideas, here's what our friends at the Scotsman have to say ...

On the flip side of one of Trump’s limitless coins is news of a Scottish golfing venture that is costing a pittance without infuriating the nature boys. Askernish GC, a course built by Old Tom Morris in 1891 but left to expire after the Second World War, is being restored to it’s former glory by volunteers keen to save one of the lost wonders of the sporting world.

For the trivial sum of £10 (paid into an honesty box) golfers take a step back in time to confront the largely un-tamed and astonishingly beautiful terrain of the Outer Hebrides. Pinehurst this is not, as players contend with the hardly flawless fairways and greens of South Uist, but as honorary life president, Kenny Dalglish, says, “it is the golfing equivalent of drinking the elixir of life”.

And for more of the glory of golf in Uist, here's what our friends at the Telegraph have to say ...