The game of golf may have started in Scotland, but the Hudson Valley spawned the first golf club in America.

The history of golf courses in the United States is rich indeed, but the oldest surviving golf club in America was established right here in the Hudson Valley by Scotsman John Reid, known as “the father of American golf.”

In February 1888, Reid and several of his friends took an armful of clubs, some golf balls and hearts full of eagerness to a pasture in Yonkers. There, in front of a gallery of bemused cows, they knocked the balls around a three-hole course. Before long, the St. Andrew’s Golf Club was born, now the oldest continuously existing golf club in the United States.

A visit to St Andrew’s is like a walk through golf history. Members now play on a superb Jack Nicklaus signature golf course, laid out on the same rolling Westchester County land to which the club moved in 1897. The course is 6,670 yards long, and is located near the quaint river town of Hastings-on-Hudson.

With panoramic river views and magnificent scenery, the Hudson Valley hosts some of the best places to golf in the country. You will find courses set on rolling hills near quaint villages that contain the historic homes of famous artists, writers, businessmen and political leaders. Throughout the region, golfer and non-golfer alike will find plenty of places to explore, comfortable lodgings and excellent restaurants.

Public golf courses in the Hudson Valley include the West Point Golf Course, located in the Hudson Highlands on the grounds of the US Military Academy. Designed by Robert Trent Jones, Jr., the West Point course offers an 18-hole, Par 71 course with practice green, lessons, pro shop and snack bar.

Few courses in the country are favored with a setting as lovely as the Garrison Golf Club, across the river from West Point. The fairways are located high on a ridge overlooking the river, with the smoky blue Catskill Mountains on the horizon. The course was designed by Dick Wilson and the layout feels like a part of the landscape, following the natural terrain of the Hudson Highlands.

The Town of Wallkill Golf Course provides a New England-style course designed between lagoons and around rolling terrain, meandering through heavily wooded areas lined with hemlock, oak and shagbark hickory. In Harrison, the Saxon Woods Golf Course is known by players as the county's second most challenging course, with rolling, wooded landscape giving this sporting course tremendous character.

Patriot Hills Golf Club in Stony Point suggests that golfers “come follow the course where history is made,” a reference to the nearby site where Revolutionary War General Anthony Wayne and his patriot troops were captured in 1779. The Par 71 course offers spectacular views of the Hudson River and the Palisades.

North at Amenia in bucolic Columbia County, the challenging Silo Ridge Country Club has been drawing a lot of day golfers to a championship 18-hole course, originally designed by Albert Zikorus. And in LaGrangeville, many golfers will enjoy the high grass, natural brush and gorse, plus the wind that blows across the wide, sweeping fairways out on The Links at Union Vale.

The Capital District region offers the Evergreen Country Club in Castleton. With Bull Run Mountain as a backdrop, Evergreen offers the challenge of a wonderful figure eight pattern layout.

Public golf courses in the Hudson Valley are so varied, it’s hard to go wrong. Whichever you choose, you can count on a challenging game in a setting that is both scenic and invigorating.