With trips across the Channel so easy and relatively inexpensive there really is no excuse to pass on a golf trip to northern France, particularly the wonderful countryside, restaurants and golf courses of Normandie. With the one-hour time difference you might have the chance to play the first afternoon if you set off early enough, but for others the trip there will occupy most of the daylight hours. With the quality of courses I can understand anyone rushing to get there but I'd rather take my time and play the next morning – I just hate getting out of the car after a long drive and jumping straight on the first tee. From the Channel Tunnel or Calais the trip along the highway (péage – but not much) is only 30 minutes or so to Le Touquet, my favourite place to stay on the coast. There are several hotels including the famous Le Manoir opposite the golf club – a classic but you can get some pretty good rates there if you look carefully. The town is very chic and very expensive, at least if you have money to spend, but the food is good in all the restaurants and it is a lovely little place to walk round of an evening.

Le Touquet has two courses – and a 9-hole course that is quite decent for an afternoon after lunch. The main course is La Mer, built by Harry Colt in 1929 and the first tee is a 10-minute walk from the clubhouse (you can drive to a small car park by the first tee but this is supposed to be a sport!) but when you stand on that tee you know you are facing not only a stiff test but a great golf course. At 6,862 yards it is long enough to test the big hitters and although the first is a fairly straightforward par-5 the second is a cunning par-three of 230 yards which will have you wondering which club to use. Sadly for a course with such a name you never actually see the sea from any part of the course, its presence hidden by high dunes and the fairways seem generously wide, typical of a links course, with no rough to speak of. There are, though, trees on either side of many of the holes but the art here is to drive long and straight and then hit arrow-straight second shots, often with a fairway wood. It might not look that good in photos and, to be honest, is not a picturesque course but it is a golfer's course and only those who enjoy a challenge will get the best out of this. I'm definitely going back!

La Forêt is gentler, more picturesque and what I would call an all-round golfer's course - a good challenge at just over 6,100 yards. Unlike its younger neighbour (La Forêt was laid out in 1904) it is appropriately named as it runs through a pine forest. Many of the greens are well protected, the 7th being a prime example. At only 175 yards it is not long but you need to hit high to fly cross bunkers and control the ball on the green. One very tricky hole worth mentioning is the 12th, a 414-yard par-4 with trees covering the entire left side as you drive. A long draw is needed to clear them and to be honest it's amazing they are still standing as they seem to be hit by two players out of every fourball. Otherwise the fairways are generously wide and there is, as with every great course, a magnificent finishing hole, a perfect par-4 dog-leg that invites you to play over the trees to cut the corner and leave a mid-iron in. Brilliant design.

Just along the coast at the mouth of the Somme, the river in whose valley upstream a few great battles were fought in the Great War, is another exquisite dunes course, appropriately called Belle Dune. I would hesitate to call it links golf as it runs through trees set in the dunes - again here as majestic as those at Le Touquet, and you never really see the sea. At 6,500 yards it's long and testing but not unfair. This is a course where, from the tee, you need to be able to shape your shots as the holes curve gently left or right - there are only about two straight holes. The dunes are a major factor, giving plenty of shots where you are seemingly blocked out, but you need to walk forward, survey the landscape and then take the line you have seen. Every hole is good and picking a few out as being exceptional is difficult. The 16th is short but very tricky as you have a tiny gap in the dunes to fire your tee-shot, then a lake guarding the entire green. From the 9th and 11th tees you drive over a lake, the former being the more difficult shot and the 13th lives up to its reputation as the toughest hole on the course. At 490 yards it doesn't look long for a par-five and the driving area is generous. But then you have a difficult uphill shot that must stay left to avoid a huge dip with a lake to the right. The overhanging trees make it a very difficult shot. Walk off there with a par and you have done well.

Also along the coast are the two courses at Hardelot, Les Pins, which naturally runs through the trees, and Les Dunes, which is more open and rolling. Both are exquisite tests of golf and straight hitters here are in their element. Les Pins is the older course and although not long it needs good tee shots to get within reach of the greens. The towering pines make it seem more narrow than it actually is but precision off the tees pays handsome dividends as well as saving you money on lost golf balls! On Les Dunes you will encounter plenty of good holes, none more difficult than the 18th, a long downhill par-5 which is very narrow. You can easily run out of room both sides so it's a hole on which to play defensive golf. However, if you need a good score on the last to win you'd be expected to go all out for it and a birdie is quite feasible, as long as you can find the ball. The Hotel du Parc, just a couple of minutes from both courses, is a lovely place to stay and serves very good food in a completely refurbished restaurant.

A lesser known course on the coast road between Boulogne and Calais is also one of the oldest, having been established in 1901, is Wimeroux. The clubhouse is small and basic but the food is good and the course is one you should enjoy if you are an adventurous golfer. The wind is always blowing and even with a 50mph tail-wind the first hole, at 560 yards, will still take a couple of very good shots to get within 8-iron distance of the green. The second is one of the toughest looking par-3s you might find - 220 yards downhill across bracken and gorse to a seemingly tiny green. You need to hit everything you've got but accurately. Fairly flat and quite open, the course is anything but simple and the wind is the biggest factor, particularly into it at the 7th, another 550 yard par-5. When the wind blows very few people get up in three. Most of the greens are protected by bunkers at the front so this is a course where you need to work the ball into position to allow yourself a straight shot in.

In a future article we shall be travelling further west along the coast towards Deauville, the heart of both cider and Calvados country. Keep watching.