North West Accommodation

Royal Birkdale's Deco Clubhouse, host to the Open 2008

Liverpool FC, Anfield. Plans are underway for Liverpool' new ground

Sport City Manchester

Northwest Outdoor Pursuits Englands Golf Coast Liverpool FC Manchester United

The Northwest as a region offers an array of outdoor activities and superb sports venues. This region comes tops for golfing venues, which include internationally renowned golf courses such as the Royal Liverpool Golf Club in Hoylake and Royal Lytham St Annes Golf Club near Blackpool. Football is also integral to the Northwest, with again internationally renowned football clubs such as Manchester United and Liverpool FC, both of which have excellent museums and football fan club shops on-site. Check out the excellent National Football Museum in Preston, just recently opened and free to enter. You can't beat Manchester for a city offering the best choice of outdoor and indoor sports activities. Many venues such as the Aquatic Centre and the Cycling Centre were key venues for the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester. These superb sports venues are now open to the public

Leisure activities abound in top coastal holiday resorts in the Northwest such as Blackpool, Southport, and Morecambe. Outdoor Activities in these coastal holiday resorts include blue flag beach swimming, indoor swimming complexes, lot of great family holiday parks with all in family entertainment - check out Marton Mere holiday park near Blackpool. For walking the region offers some beautiful terrain including the Forest of Bowland in the Ribble Valley, the superb Rossendale Valley and Rossendale way and the Wirral coast is perfect for idyllic coastal walking, including the little known tidal islands, the Hilbre Islands in the Dee Estuary. If you prefer the cultural indoor leisure pursuit, then the choice of museums and art galleries across the Northwest will amaze. Many museums such as the Science and Industry museum in Manchester or the Liverpool Tate Gallery on the Albert Docks are now free to enter, making them excellent cheap but fun packed family days out!

England's Golf Coast in the North West

Southport sits at the very centre of England's golf coast in the North West. Some of the UK's finest golf courses are here along the Wirral, Lancashire and Mersey coastline inclusive of three famous Royals - Royal Birkdale, Royal Liverpool and Royal Lytham & St Annes. These three historic British golf courses have regularly played host to the Open Championships, and in 2008 Royal Birkdale is to host the Open Championships again.

The Royals attract a huge international audience and are complimented by a host of other premier private and municipal golf courses in the region including Formby Hall, Southport & Ainsdale, Hesketh and Hillside Golf Club. Southport and the Wirral combined boast 7 championship courses. Golf choice is huge in the area and from Southport 27 golf courses are within a 30 minute drive, whilst a further 160 golf courses are within a one hour drive. Southport can justifiably claim to be one of the UK's golf capitals!

Many of the courses around the Royals on the North West Golf Coast play host to other major golf competitions such as the Ryder Cup and other amateur events. The Ryder Cup has been at Southport & Ainsdale and Royal Birkdale twice. They also serve as qualifier courses for the Open.

The history of golf in the North West is as rich as Scotland's Ayrshire and Angus Golf Coasts. One of the oldest historic seaside golf courses is Royal Liverpool which dates from 1869 and lays claim to being the first to host the Amateur in 1885. The North West coastline offered the perfect territory for the expansion of golf links courses, many of which are bordered by the distinctive sand dunes, as the popularity of golf grew. Historic golf facts pertaining to the region include the use of the first rubber-cored ball in 1902 at Royal Liverpool and the origins of the English Golf Union at Hesketh.

The Royals on the North West Golf Coast

The North West's three famous Royals - Birkdale, Lytham St Annes and Royal Liverpool stand as three of the UK's most famous and popular golf courses. Each sits within their own hub of numerous other championship courses. Royal Birkdale is situated on the stunning Sefton Coast near Southport, Royal Liverpool sits on the Wirral Coast near Hoylake and to the north Royal Lytham & St Annes sits on the Lancashire Coast. International visitors are well served by UK airports in the area including Liverpool John Lennon Airport for the Wirral and Southport, Blackpool International Airport for Lytham St Annes and indeed Southport and Manchester Airport for access to all.

Royal Birkdale near Southport, with its spectacular art deco clubhouse overlooking the 18th green, dates from 1889 when the club was formed. The course here began life as a 9 hole course but by 1897 the club had shifted to the Birkdale Hills with an 18 hole course. Birkdale has consistently evolved with the times incorporating new challenges alongside the always present challenge of the sea breezes blowing down the fairways. The course was awarded the prestigious Royal title in 1951 and in the early 1990s the greens were completely redesigned. You're treading in the footsteps of some golf legends indeed here at Royal Birkdale including Anrnold Palmer and Peter Thomson who won the Open twice here at Birkdale.

A regular host of the Open (most recently in 2006), Royal Liverpool at Hoylake actually began life as a racecourse. The golf course dates from 1869 and second only to the smaller Westward Ho! course on the Devon coast, Royal Liverpool is the oldest seaside golf course in the country. Closely connected to the Amateur game (the first Amateur was held here), Royal Liverpool has boasted a selection of local golfing greats including John Ball. Renowned as a great challenging course at 6240 yards with the added pressure of the sea breezes, Royal Liverpool was revamped to great effect in recent times by the architect Donald Steel.

Royal Lytham & St Annes golf course is ideally placed between two classic English seaside resorts on the Lancashire coast. Receiving the Royal stamp in 1926, in that same year Royal Lytham & St Annes also hosted the first Open! A challenge indeed, the course faces the elements of the Irish Sea - the trees have a distinctive lean. Royal Lytham & St Annes is the only big championship course to open with a Par 3, and the course's first four holes and last five are widely regarded as the hardest golf challenge in the UK. The classic Victorian clubhouse overlooks the 18th green.

Football Northwest. Liverpool FC, Manchester United & the National Football Museum

It is more than fitting that the National Football Museum should be located in Preston. It was Preston North End who were the first champions of the football league in 1889, and in the same season they won the FA Cup making them the first team to win the double. The museum itself, located conveniently off Junction 31 of the M6, is split into three sections - First Half, Second Half and the Hall of Fame. It's a brilliantly structured journey which begins in the 'First Half', taking you back through the origins of the game and 150 years of football history. This social history of football pays attention to detail, highlighting perhaps some of the hidden names in football like the first black players in the 1880s, through to women's football teams which apparently attracted great attention in the early 1920s. The pride of the First Half exhibition space is it's FIFA collection of football memorabilia.

Take a trip to internationally renowned club Manchester United at Old Trafford. The museum on-site includes three floors crammed with exhibitions including a Trophy Room, the Legends Hall of Fame, Club History and to top it off a stadium tour where, if you must, you too can walk through the players' tunnel.

If ever there was an English football club with justification for having a museum, its got to be Liverpool FC. Like most great clubs, its had it's share of top class players, but what makes The Reds stand apart from the others is a record of trophy winning second-to-none, made all the better under the reign of Gerard Houllier, by the historic treble winning season of 2000-01, and the League Cup in 2002-3! The Museum & Stadium Tour has consistently been praised for it's customer care, and many testimonials have been received endorsing the great day out to be had at Anfield.

Walking in the Northwest.

Rossendale is perfect for walkers. The shape and form of the countryside is mostly rugged moor land. Valleys are deep-cut by streams and the River Irwell. There are many walks to explore in Rossendale, with an excellent footpath network - see Rawtenstall Tourist Information Point for the guided walks brochure. Check out the Irwell Sculpture Trail (link to the right).

Did you know that the Ribble Valley area around Stonyhurst is thought to be the inspiration for J.R.R. Tolkien's 'Middle Earth', in the Lord of the Rings. 'Tolkien Trail' tours are now on offer for fans. You can see why this area might have inspired Tolkien - it's stunning moorland with striking and spectacular scenery.

Wycoller Country Park near Colne in Lancashire, is noted by the Brontes in their books, is one of the most beautiful Country Parks in Lancashire. Located just north of Colne, and moving towards Haworth (link Haworth pages), the Bronte sisters referred to some of the nearby landmarks in books such as Wuthering Heights and Jane Eyre. Wycoller has many footpaths leading to local beauty spots such as Bank House and Wycoller Beck. Disabled toilet facilities are on-site, and there's an information centre at the Aisled Barn, which was built in the 1630s. Parking is made easy, with two car parks, one at Trawden Road and one at Haworth Road.

Check out the stunning three tidal islands, situated in the Dee Estuary. These islands are a wildlife haven and are called Little Eye, Middle Eye and Hilbre and all are natural nature reserves, with the mudflats, sandbanks and marshes providing ample food for migratory birds. They're free to access, but you need to book in advance and get an access permit (only 50 people are allowed over at any one time).

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