NAPLESILLUSTRATED.COM | DECEMBER 2018 45
ESCAPE
By Daphne NikolopoulosBEYOND GOLF
Gleneagles may be one of the world’s best places to tee o, but this
SCOTTISH ICON’s charms are more than turf-deep
onald Matheson, it could be said, was the Henry Flagler
of Scotland. In the early 1900s, the head of the Caledonian
Railway Company sought to build a destination hotel for
wealthy train travelers (sound familiar?), a place he deemed “a pal-
ace in the glens.” In Perthshire, on a long stretch of moorlands in the
shadow of the Ochil Hills and the Trossachs, he laid out two master-
piece courses that, to this day, feature some of golf’s most dramatic
views and mind-bending challenges.
The King’s links-style and Queen’s heathland courses at Gleneagles
Hotel have captivated sportsmen and aristocrats for a full century, and
maintain a place among the world’s most iconic golf playgrounds. Ask
anyone about the King’s tricky seventeenth hole, colorfully namedD