BADDECK, Canada—That the best golfer from Canada these days is a left-hander comes as no surprise to Canadians. That’s because Mike Weir is among a remarkably high percentage of golfers from north of the border who play as southpaws. Out here in Nova Scotia and the other maritime provinces, it runs to about 40%.

If you are paired with another twosome at Bell Bay Golf Club on Cape Breton Island, there is a good chance at least one of them will play left-handed. It’s all those right-handers who played left wing in junior hockey.

“It actually started with our generation,” said Ted Stonehouse, head pro at Bell Bay, a southpaw golfer who grew up in Ontario and played junior golf at the same time as Weir. “That’s when the equipment started to become more readily available for left-handers.

“I was fortunate to be able to get a good set of irons through Dave Barr (a Canadian who won twice on the PGA Tour in the 1980s) when I was young, so I was able to play left-handed from an early age. When we play in our (PGA section events), it’s not unusual for an entire threesome to be left-handers.”

No matter which side you play from, Bell Bay Golf Club is an experience to remember. Designed by noted Canadian architect Thomas McBroom, Bell Bay was voted best new course in Canada in 1998 and will host the 2005 Canadian Amateur Championship next August.

In keeping with Nova Scotia’s relationship with the sea, every hole at Bell Bay is named for a ship that sailed the Seven Seas from Baddeck, which was settled by Scottish shipbuilders.

“Baddeck is a saltwater port, and ships have been built here, and sailed from here, since earliest times,” author James Lamb said. “Many of them were known in harbors around the world, their names reflecting their Cape Breton origins.

“It seems fitting that this seaside golf course should recall some of those famous ships by giving their names to appropriate holes, whose character is reflected in their names.”

Baddeck is located high above the Bras d’or Lakes, North America’s majestic inland sea, and the course has views of the bay from which it derives its name on several holes.

Across the bay is the estate of Alexander Graham Bell, which he named Beinn Bhreagh (Gaelic for Beautiful Mountain). The inventor spent the latter part of his life on the estate and died there in 1922. The Alexander Graham Bell National Historic Site houses the largest collection of Bell artifacts and archives in the world.

“I have traveled the globe,” Bell once said. “I have seen the Canadian and American Rockies, the Andes and the Alps and the highlands of Scotland, but for simple beauty, Cape Breton outrivals them all.”

Upon this landscape, McBroom created a golf masterpiece.

Weir played the course in the 2001 Wayne Gretzky and Friends Invitational charity event along with NHL stars Gretzky, Brett Hull and Joe Sakic, giving Bell Bay world-wide notice when it was televised on the Golf Channel.

At the Canadian Amateur, some of the best golfers north of the border will play a challenging layout that stretches to 7,037 yards from the back tees, with a course rating of 74.3 and a slope of 136.

But Bell Bay is eminently playable for all golfers, with a rating of 69.9 and a slope of 125 from the white tees.

“That was one thing that Thomas McBroom did so well, especially at the beginning of the course,” said Stonehouse, who was chosen 2002 PGA Club Professional of the Year by the Canadian PGA. “That allows the golfer to get into the course right away.

“There’s not a lot of trouble at the beginning. It’s generous off the tee, there are some great views and it’s not terribly penalizing. The course can bare its teeth later on, but even the novice golfer can get comfortable early.”

The course starts with three strong par fours, measuring 407, 415 and 433 yards from the back tees, but all are considerably shorter from the three other tee boxes.

The best of the opening threesome is No. 3, a 433-yard hole named for Scrapper, a legendary craft built at Bell’s laboratories at Beinn Bhreagh that can be seen across the bay from this fairway.

“It’s a slight dogleg right and is the No. 1 handicap hole,” Stonehouse said. “It’s just a solid par four. You can shorten the hole a little by hitting your drive over the bunker on the right side of the fairway.

“The hole gets its difficulty from the second shot, which is uphill from between 135 to 175 yards into the prevailing wind. But it’s not difficult to hit the greens at Bell Bay because they are pretty good sized and they are not over undulating.”

The course begins to toughen up at No. 6, the most challenging of the par threes at 227 yards from the tips to a green guarded by seven bunkers.

The hole is named for Typhoon, a locally-built 45-foot ketch that crossed the Atlantic Ocean in a then-record 15 days in 1920. The voyage was made even more remarkable because it was accomplished entirely under sail after the engine failed two hours into the trip.

“It’s a long shot no matter what tee you are playing because it plays into the wind,” Stonehouse said. “For most players, it takes a long iron that must be struck solidly. But the shot is more visually intimidating than it really is.

“Despite all the bunkers, it’s actually pretty open at the front of the green and you can hit the ball short and run the it up onto the green.”

When you make the turn at Bell Bay, the best is yet to come, especially what the locals call “The Final Four.”

But before the golfer gets there, he must navigate No. 13, a 508-yard par five named for the brig Challenger, which was built in Baddeck in 1848 and lost at sea the following year on a journey from Sydney, Nova Scotia, to Boston.

Like the ship, many golf balls find a watery grave in the lake that runs nearly the last half of the hole and guards the left side of the green.

“This is very much a risk/reward hole because it is usually downwind and gives you a chance to reach the green in two,” Stonehouse said. “The better player plays it as a par four in his head because if you hit a good drive you have between a three and five iron coming into the green.

“But the problem is, you have to play that shot over the water and there is no room to miss left or long, and there are bunkers on the right. And you can’t see the entire green from the fairway. You just have to trust your swing and hit it.

“It’s not an easy lay-up there either because the fairway gets narrow close to the green.”

Often when a course designer finds a particularly good piece of land, he will create a spectacular hole there and build the rest of the course around it.

McBroom built four of them and created what some critics have called the best finishing stretch in Canadian golf.

“The most dramatic land was saved for the finishing holes and they are exhilarating to say the least,” McBroom said. “(They) amount to what I think is one of the best finishing sequences anywhere.”

No. 15 is Perseverance, a daunting 463-yard par four with one of the smaller greens on the course. The hole was named for a brigantine built in 1845 that was later re-rigged as a schooner.

The 16th hole is Argyle, named for a brig built in Baddeck that was given the name of a town in Scotland. This is the shortest, at 365 yards, but perhaps most scenic par four on the course, routed through a densely wooded corridor of trees that is especially impressive when the fall colors are in their glory.

But the best at Bell Bay is saved for the absolute last. No. 17 is the signature hole, while No. 18 has the signature view.

On the 182-yard 17th, called Banshee, the tee boxes are perched on a hillside and the shot must carry a spectacularly wooded ravine. Banshee was a female spirit in Gaelic folklore whose wailing warned the clan of danger. The cry is similar to that heard from golfers as their tee shots disappear into the ravine.

“That’s our most photographed hole,” Stonehouse said. “It’s just a tremendous par three over an environmental buffer zone. The green slopes from back to front, but if you hit the green the ball will hold. You just don’t want to be short and right because it is very difficult to get up and down from there.”

The 18th hole is named for Bradalbane, a 101-foot Barque that is believed to be the largest and best vessel built at Baddeck. It was instrumental in Rev. Norman MacLeod’s expeditions to New Zealand in 1857.

There is a spectacular panoramic view overlooking the Bras d’oro from the tee box on the 566-yard par five and the prevailing wind from behind the golfer allows him to let out the sails with the driver.

“It’s a solid par five and even though it’s downwind, this is usually a three-shot hole,” Stonehouse said. “It takes two of your Sunday best to hit the green in two. I get there only once or twice a year.

“You have to be smart with your lay-up because the fairway gets narrow and there is a swale up near the green. It’s a strategic hole. There are bunkers short and left and the trees come into play on the right. If your ball goes in there, you are toast because it’s a very steep slope.

“It’s a great finish.”

But that’s not the end of golf in Cape Breton and Nova Scotia.

For the perfect golf doubleheader, play Bell Bay and Highland Links in Ingonish Beach, a classic Stanley Thompson layout on the edge of Cape Breton Highland National Park. Highland Links was selected as the No. 1 course in Canada in 2000 by Score Golf magazine and as one of the top 100 courses in the world several times by Golf magazine.

Also worth the trip are Dundee Resort and Golf Course in West Bay, Le Portage Golf Club on the banks of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and on the Cabot Trail in Cheticamp, Passchendaele Golf Club in Reserve Mines, Lingan Golf and Country Club (established in 1895) in Sydney and Seaview Golf and Country Club in North Sydney.

The Inverary Resort in Baddeck, known for its Celtic charm and lakeside boardwalk, offers stay-and-play packages for Bell Bay Golf Club, as do Glenghorm Beach Resort in Ingonish and Ceilidh Country Lodge in Baddeck.

Other places to say include Dundee Resort in West Bay, Castle Moffett in Baddeck, the Maritime Inn in Port Hawkesbury, Chanterelle Country Inn in Baddeck and Haddon Hall Inn in Chester—Nova Scotia’s version of the French Riviera near Halifax, where many of the Titanic victims are buried.

Hockey, not baseball, is the National Pastime here, but because of Nova Scotia’s nautical history, the people know a portsider (or left-hander, to you land-lubbers) when they see one.