The Links At Union Vale

The Links at Union Vale opened to the public in 2000 in LaGrangeville, in Dutchess County. It began with a group of Irish golfers in the New York area who were tired of fighting for tee times and decided to build a course of their own. They hired architect Stephen Kay, who had recently built the Links of North Dakota on similar open ground, and he fashioned the 18 holes from about 200 acres of former cattle and farmland on a remarkably small construction budget. The nearly treeless site looks out toward the Hudson Highlands and the Catskills, and Kay dressed it with fescue and bentgrass, pot bunkers, water and natural hazards in a links style, although most holes still call for aerial approaches. The course was named the best new public course of the year by Suburban Golf Magazine, and its pub, the Harp and Eagle, still nods to the club's Irish roots.