Featured Course:
The Heritage Club is
Plantation Golf at its Finest

By Shane Sharp,
Contributing Writer

MYRTLE BEACH - Have you ever wanted to experience the drive up to Augusta National's famed clubhouse, and then come to the realization that experiencing such a drive is as likely as you suiting up for the quarterback position at the University of Georgia this season?

The Heritage Club, a must play for anyone visiting the South Strand area of Myrtle Beach, can provide the sensation of cruising up the entrance of Bobby Jones' masterpiece without having to challenge Quincy Carter for the starting signal caller job in Athens.

• Front Nine at the Heritage Club: The Calm Before the Storm • The Back Nine at the Heritage Club Sparks Signature Hole Debate

"The course was built on the site of two plantations, rice and indigo were the two crops farmed," says Head Professional Pete Hymes. "We are blessed with some beautiful trees that are hundreds of years old. The great thing about Heritage is that it gives you the feeling that it has been around forever."

"Beautiful trees" is a vast understatement for anyone who has knocked the silly white ball around the Grand Strand. At the Heritage Club, the typical pines of coastal South Carolina give way to Magnolias ands Oaks Tree - features as southern as biscuits, grits, and sweet tea.

Just how inspiring is the track at the Heritage Club? Hymes confides that rolling into the club as the rooster crows is second to few other experiences in life.

"I have spent many a day here over the past seven years," says Hymes. "There are not too many good things you can find at six in the morning, but walking up to the club in the morning, you get the feeling that everything is good is life."

Once you experience the two distinct nines that the Heritage Club has to offer, Hymes words shed their philosophic guises and become prophetic in nature.

"The course serves up Jeckle and Hyde nines," says Hymes. "The front meanders through trees and dense forest. The back nine is the Jeckyl side of the course. The front nine is kind of tame and not real long, the back is five to seven shots harder."

While the front nine is somewhat "agua free", water comes into play on most of the back nine. Couple this with the fact that the Dan Maples' designed bunkers at Heritage are, in the words of Hymes, "designed to be hazards, so you better take your medicine and get it out," and you have yourself a serious test of golf on your hands.

This week at Myrtlebeachgolf.com, we take a closer look at the Heritage Club and the championship golf experience this distinguished track of the South Strand has to offer.