Berkley Hall's South Course

By Joel Zuckerman

t’s a striking golf course in its own right, but the most notable aspect of Berkeley Hall’s South Course upon initial inspection is how different it looks from the original North Course.

Berkeley sales executive Duke Delcher is a former Walker Cup player and South Carolina Player of the Year. He illustrates the differences between the two Tom Fazio “core golf” designs. “On the North Course (7,117 yards, 73.9/134) there’s lots of separation because of the flowering coastal grass plantings and elevation changes. You play a hole, then turn the corner and see another, which is great in its own way. The topography of the South Course (7,126 yards, 74.5/139) is different though. There are magnificent expanses of views, under and through the mature pines, where multiple holes can be viewed at once. This is truly the parkland golf experience that was the standard through much of the last century.”

Delcher’s assessment is accurate. While Fazio’s initial effort at Berkeley makes abundant use of a colorfully flowering plant known as mully grass to delineate fairways, the more recent incarnation instead depends heavily on tall Carolina Pines. The original course has the most substantial elevation changes in the Lowcountry, and while the parkland style South Course features some of the gently rolling terrain seen on the earlier design, here there’s only a subtle hint of changing topography. While the two courses have distinct design features, the most important element is one they have in common. They are both pure golf experiences, with no road crossings, infrastructure or housing to be built on the interior of the playing area. There’s another common denominator as well. The South Course, like its older sibling, is an excellent and challenging test of the game.

It’s a truism throughout golf, but choosing the proper tee box to suit one’s ability is imperative at Berkeley’s South Course. “I’d hate to see a 20 handicap who doesn’t hit it very far attempt to play the black tees,” says a member of the professional staff. The middle markers, a shade less than 6,700 yards with a 131 slope, afford plenty of golf course for the vast majority. These blue tees are not only 500 yards longer than the whites, but on certain holes the tee box angles towards the hazards. This makes a benign hole from the forward markers a much sterner challenge, as forced carries over water or to clear bunkers enter the equation.

The par 3 holes are among the highlights here. The 183 yard third hole requires a middle or longer iron to a contoured green flanked by a large bunker, while the 150 yard fifth necessitates a tee shot with water front and left of the target. A slightly raised green 210 yards from the tee box means a wood for most players on the staunch eleventh. Only a precise short iron to the 140 yard 16th will yield a birdie putt, playing downhill to a green ringed by bunkers.

Most of the two shot holes are strong, the 414 yard seventh in particular. A bold drive over fairway bunkers will leave a considerable approach shot to a massive double green. Sharing the same putting surface as the par five ninth, the contours and undulations here are as tricky as any on a course full of imaginative, amoeba shaped greens. I’m not overly fond of the awkward 14th, playing just over 300 yards from the middle markers, though. Bashers can drive the green with relative ease, assuming a straight tee shot. But those whose outer limits are in the 230-240 yard range are forced to aim well left of the green to find a surprisingly wide fairway that’s virtually invisible from the tee. Fortunately the holes surrounding this enigma are stirring. 13 plays 390 yards curving gently around a lagoon. The 15th is 435 straightaway yards with bunkers flanking water left and yet another dangerously sloping green. The occasional false fronts and ball collecting swales add even more interest to these pristine TifEagle Bermuda greens, a completely different surface then the Crenshaw bentgrass greens found on the North Course. It should also be noted that the close proximity of greens to tees make this course a walker’s delight, and something of an anomaly in the Lowcountry.

A brief word about bathrooms in closing. Never in hundreds of course reviews, travel features or resort profiles have I felt compelled to make reference to the on-course facilities at any golf establishment. Then again, I’ve never encountered anything remotely approaching the structure near the fifth tee at Berkeley’s South Course. The soft lighting, classic golf photos framed on the wall and rolled cloth towels make this pit stop a comfort station in every sense of the word. It’s faint praise anointing it as the finest green-grass lavatory I’ve seen. But what’s equally true is that it has as much or more ambience than many a 19th hole or grillroom I’ve loitered in over the years. It’s just a small detail, but another telling example of why Berkeley Hall has established itself as one of the premiere destinations in the area.

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