FEATURE STORY

The English (and Germans and French) are coming! Myrtle Beach's foreign influx

MURRELS INLET, S.C. (Nov. 2, 2004) - The calls come in regularly, pleas really, for a little taste of life from across the pond.

"I'll get these calls asking if we've got football," said English Glover, the bartender at Royal Oak Pub & Beer Garden. "And I'll tell them, 'Yeah, we've got the Panthers, the Steelers, the Eagles and the Patriots this week."'

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This brings an exasperated sigh to the other end of line. No, I mean football. Manchester United, Liverpool, the caller will say, a little disbelieving he has to explain.

"We're hoping to have soccer, what they call the real football, in here by next year," Glover said. "We really have to get it to keep up around here."

Royal Oak is an English-themed restaurant/bar in the shadow of Myrtle Beach. An English bar in South Carolina used to mean a tattered souvenir flag out front and a nominal fish and chips menu offering cooked up by the high school kids in the back. Not anymore. Not around here.

This isn't your father's Myrtle Beach. The English are coming! And the Germans, the French and the Norwegians, too. A virtual golfing foreign legion is discovering this longtime American swing-time mecca.

"Probably the biggest change in Myrtle Beach golf over the last few years is the increase in Europeans coming over here to play," said Rick Schultz, the general manager at Myrtlewood Golf Club. "We see a lot more golfers from the UK, Germany, Ireland. It's become an important part of our business."

A week spent in Myrtle Beach in late October/early November brought the trend to life. Foreign accents could be heard on every course visited. Guys like Paul Scroft of London were out there in force, enjoying every sunny bargain swing.

"It's an incredible value with the golf," Scroft said. "We play three courses here for what it would cost us to play one back home. And you cannot top a 29-degree Celsius (about 82 Fahrenheit) November the 2nd, can you?"

Golf course owners, hotels and package companies love the European golfers because they usually have money and they usually plan to be here for a while.

"Our average stay for a Northern U.S. golfer is four to five days," said Jim Powalie, the GM at Myrtlewood Villas. "For the European golfer, our average stay is 10 days."

The extended stays are causing more businesses to gear themselves toward foreign visitors. Don't look now, but the Myrtle Beach area is becoming a little more cosmopolitan. There are still shooting ranges, pawn shops and kitsch souvenir stores galore, but there are also establishments like Royal Oak giving visitors a taste of home and South Carolinians a new taste option.

Royal Oak offers English beers like John Cousin Ale, Woodpecker English Cedar and Rogue Red on tap. Its menu includes traditional English staples like liver and onions, baked beans and toast and of course vinegar for the French fries, er chips. And the fish and chips is a dish prepared with reverence. The place is owned by two brothers from London, one who's moved into the Myrtle Beach area.

"I've been told our fish and chips is better quality than what they get back home," Englis said, laughing.

Of course, not every foreign visitor is taken in by Myrtle Beach's hospitality attempts. Pierre Lalmont jokes that he hasn't seen "a decent French restaurant in 500 miles," but that's hardly stopped him from planning frequent trips to Myrtle Beach.

"I'm here for the golf, like all the rest," Lalmont said. "Keep these courses looking beautiful and I'll always be back. When I want a good meal, I go to Paris. When I want a good golfing adventure, I come here."

Wayne Welden, the director of golf at Man O'War, believes that the off-the-course fuss is largely unimportant. An appearance by a legendary Norwegian chef is not going to mean as much as an appearance by a renowned golf architect like Tom Fazio.

"These guys are golfers and just like any other golfers that's pretty much all they're focused on," Welden said. "The Europeans are coming to Myrtle Beach for the same reasons the guys from New York have been coming for decades. It's outstanding golf for a great value.

"Of course, it's probably an even better deal for them."

Englis admits he sometimes gets jealous when he hears all the stories at the bar about how far the Euro goes in Myrtle Beach.

"I wish it was as affordable for us to go over there and play their courses as it is for them to come over and plays ours," Englis said. "Some of the English golfers get here and they don't want to leave because they've never seen anything like it, as far as so many courses in one area."

It's the joy of discovery, every explorer at heart's real thrill.

"You think everyone knows about Myrtle Beach," Welden said. "It's such an American institution. But if you think about it, it's still really a little unknown around the world. That's changing though. Every year that's changing more and more."

Guys like Englis are learning to adjust. Soon, he'll be debating the game of Michael Owens rather than Terrell Owens at the bar. After all, the world's taking its driver to Myrtle Beach.