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Last updated: June 20. 2007 12:32PM
GOLF
Seaside Golfing at Bald Head Island
Bring a box, no, make it two boxes of new golf balls. You’re going to need them. Sleepy alligators chill on lagoon banks at the Bald Head Island Club and osprey depart and return to the island each year, following their precision flight schedule.
Certain traits of this land remain intact, just as they were when renowned golf course architect George Cobb carved 18 unique holes through the maritime forest and along the dune ridge in the early 1970s.
Egrets and ibises wade in the marsh. Peaceful putting abounds except on the severely sloped first green, wind-whipped and slippery, fastest on the course by far. It can plant the fear of the three-putt deep in the darkest crevice of a golfer’s soul. As we tee off, the chilly wind is whipping my pants leg.
“The way you guys are playing, I’ll just stay in the cart and buy drinks,” longtime Bald Head resident Bob Liesegang says three holes into our round. v Liesegang bought a lot on this island in 1978, more than 20 years before he took up the game.
Now the Brooklyn native and retired IBM salesman is a competitive 20-handicapper.
He and fellow playing partner Ed Whitley remember the good ol’ days on Bald Head. Whitley, retired from Dun and Bradstreet financial planners, splits his time between here and Greensboro. He used to spend the first week of the year on the island, bringing three golfing buddies. They usually had the course to themselves.
Though Whitley never has trouble getting a tee time today, he still cherishes those early memories.
“We long for those days,” Whitley says. “But things have changed. Everywhere has changed.”
Back then the island was a little more primitive. Residents and visitors communicated via CB radio. One phone was available for calls off the island – and it used a microwave signal that passing ships would regularly interrupt, killing a call in mid-sentence. The original inhabitants called themselves the Generator Society – a reference to their lone source of electricity.
“It was an interesting time for us all,” Whitley says. “All the families were really close and had an open-door policy.”
There are tales – tall ones surely? – of foursomes playing in the nude and all-night parties that lasted until the last cube of ice melted.
Yet change blows through Bald Head Island Club’s salt-swept air. The Cape Fear region’s only true seaside resort, a long-time home for 240 golfing members has recently opened its doors wider to resort guests, golf package players, anyone seeking an island golfing getaway.
“We want to give everyone the feel of playing a private course,” says Ron Thomason, golf professional at Bald Head Island for the past two years. “We want them to enjoy the essence of the island experience and want them to feel like they are a member for a day.”
At a leisurely pace, of course. Island time, or turtle time as it’s called in appreciation of the loggerhead sea turtles that come ashore each year in early summer to lay their eggs.
Thomason knows how to provide private course treatment. He came here from Linville Ridge, a prestigious club in the N.C. mountains. He spent six seasons as a golf professional at Linville Ridge but traded the colder climate for a ferry pass. He hasn’t looked back and enjoys the challenge of pleasing two diverse clienteles.
After Thomason rips another 300-yard drive down the middle, Liesegang smiles. “That’s a good shot, pro,” he says. “How much did you say you’ve been playing?”
The current membership is committed to making the entire property first-class and it’s obvious the minute the golf cart transporting you from the ferry terminal rolls to a stop near the bag drop. The sprawling clubhouse underwent a $6.5 million renovation and reopened last fall featuring casual and formal dining areas.
Flat-screen high-definition televisions hang on the walls inside the grill room, which overlooks both the golf course and the croquet area.
Bottles of water, divot tools, range balls – private club trappings – are all complimentary to Bald Head guests, who wonder if the course will beat them this time out. Four sets of tees – ranging from 4,847 yards to 6,804 yards – await.
Golf Digest lists Bald Head in its Top 100 places to play. In the Myrtle Beach area of more than 100 courses, the magazine ranks it No. 12. Bald Head member Win Stevens, retired former Golf Digest staffer, fell in love with the course when he played it for the magazine in the 1980s.
A longtime member at prestigious Winged Foot, site of the 2006 U.S. Open, Stevens says he traveled and played many golf courses during his stint as advertising director at Golf Digest. Many average, some awful – and a handful, like Bald Head, that etched a permanent place in his golfing memory. “We love the raw product and we want this course to become a must-play. It makes so much sense,” Stevens says.
That’s why the members chose to spend $1.4 million on a drainage and irrigation project last year. The effects can be felt already. Pesky saltwater isn’t the pest it once was and the Tif-Dwarf Bermuda greens and fairways turn forest green months before the prime growing season thanks in part to the removal of another nuisance: phragmites, a noxious, invasive wetland plant that chokes out sunlight and reduces air circulation.
“It was like a jungle in there,” Liesegang says of the holes that run through the Maritime Forest. “Dark and really not much to look at. It’s a huge improvement.”
Without the phragmites swallowing up errant shots, golf balls are easier to find. And though that might decrease pro shop revenue from golf ball sales, it improves pace of play. Still, remember this: when in doubt, leave the driver in the bag.
Bald Head Island offers many unique sights and sounds. Turtles plop into ponds mid-backswing. Wisps of Spanish Moss drape live oaks and dangle from intricate limbs.
The tide rolls out and in again. Less than a year ago, the club replaced the benches, ball washers and trash cans on the course, Thomason says while we all watch his tee shot depart with a long, high draw. The sea spray green and gray motif blends in with its surroundings, adding to Bald Head’s natural feel.
The setting is peaceful.
Each hole is a separate, unique experience. None are parallel, which means you’re never going in quite the same direction. And the wind blows - often shifting in direction. It blows down your back from the left side on one hole, then slightly in your face and from the right on the next. Sometimes, it changes in mid-swing. Still, missing a four-foot putt doesn’t evoke the same anger it might on the mainland.
Because of the layout of the course, even when tee times are booked, you feel like your foursome is the only one playing. There’s never a point when you can see what’s going on at another hole. That means golfers - from beginners to scratch - play at their own pace.
“You don’t know anybody else is out there,” Thomason says. “You don’t see anybody else on a fairway. You can remember a lot of the holes the first time you play it. That’s the mark of a good design.”
The course is almost like three or four courses in one, meandering into the forest and back out to the ocean.
The first six holes on the back nine are inland, protected from the elements by the maritime forest. Temperatures rise and fall, the layout lulling you to sleep. You emerge from the forest, climb to the 16th tee, the highest peak on the property, and the Atlantic Ocean greets you in full view to the left, a great asset to counter the blustery wind that will berate you here.
Regardless how many balls may be lost – some frustrated swingers have been known to buy a box of 20 balls before teeing off then restock at the turn – it’s a walk and ride through paradise.
A pleasing test of golf that pleases the senses and makes one wish the ferry ride home were one more day away.
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