The Currituck Club

The Outer Banks of North Carolina are a series of barrier islands far off the shore, which makes coastal golf an obvious idea. Unfortunately for Rees Jones, he wasn’t granted any room on a white sand beach but that doesn’t mean he didn’t find a way to make coastal golf happen at Currituck.

Players will spend much of the round winding through coastal scrub and residences (well off from the fairway) before finding most of the course’s most memorable holes on the west half of the island, playing alongside vast saltwater marshes, which offer views every bit as idyllic as your traditional beach view. Players will get their first taste of these eye-catching holes on No. 8, a par four that plays over a finger of estuary from the tee. Perhaps this tantalizing sample is intended to keep players from lingering too long at the clubhouse during the turn!

Toward the end of the round, the course will enter its showcase run, with four holes playing along the marsh. No. 15, the most daring, is a par three that plays across the water, with danger lying on all sides.

And beware: The wind is every bit as strong on the west side of this skinny island as it is on the east.