Every year, and just like clockwork, The Open Championship, whether it is at St. Andrews, Birkdale, Troon, Carnoustie, Royal Liverpool, or like this year at Royal Portrush in Northern Ireland, inspires me to want to golf down by the sea. If you’re like me and you love Links Golf, too, you probably feel the very same way. One place you can get that feeling is playing Twisted Dune Golf Course in Egg Harbor Township.
Located right along EHT’s “golf main street” of Ocean Heights Avenue, with holes named “Twisted”, “Punter’s Alley”, and “St. Brigid’s Hollow”, Twisted Dune has the wide and gently rolling fairways symbolic of traditional links by the sea with fair, and smooth, and very puttable greens featuring British Isles-style fescue and sandy hills.
Often acclaimed by Golfweek and other publications as a Top public golf course “you can play” in New Jersey, you can almost hear the bagpipes playing when you drive up to the First Tee.
A must play golf course in South Jersey, Twisted Dune Golf offers a visually stunning golf experience that rewards accuracy and course management only just minutes off the Garden State Parkway and close in proximity to many of the popular attractions in Atlantic City, Ocean City and Wildwood.
“ When people think of links courses, they usually think of only a course being sparse of trees, but it also includes a variety of other conditions associated with being near the water,” said Empire Golf Management’s Twisted Dune Director of Golf Jim Endres. “ Twisted Dune exhibits all of those features.”
Designer Archie Struthers moved two million cubic yards of earth to bring this remarkable course to fruition; creating a true taste of the Scottish Coast to the Jersey Shore. The virtually tree-less terrain exposes the course to he wind, which can, at times, become a real factor, like the traditionally seaside links of the UK, making playing a low game, different than that of parkland-style courses, and utilizing creativity, and touch, on approaches to the green and putting the ball into the holes.
“Consistent wind couples with few trees creates firm soil which requires a golfer to think more about their shots and how the golf ball will react once it hits the ground,” said Endres.
Deep ravines, towering grass-covered hills, and well over 100 deep traps and bunkers, make Twisted Dune’s 7,200 yards a memorable golfing experience for all. Featuring four par fives at over 500 yards, ten par fours, and and four par threes, Twisted Dune GC is the type of course that serious golfers love to play again and again!
And with its many tee box options, Twisted Dune is also one of the most friendly to play golf courses for players of every skill level, as well.
Getting to play bumps and runs and long pitch shots is a rare treat, and challenge, for local golfers, or any golfers anywhere else for that matter, but the opportunities, and the fun of playing those unique, and some would say “old school”, kind of strokes, abound at Twisted Dune.
The terrific Par 3s are another reason, and make for a most memorable round at the South Jersey Shore’s truest Scottish-inspired golf course.
“ The variety of our par threes are the best at The Shore,” said Endres. “ People love playing them.”
Of Twisted’s short holes, the most recognizable, and most unforgettable, has got to be the one at the end, the magnificent and daunting Par 3 Sixteenth. Playing all the way back to more than 200 yards, and all carry over a deep, sandy, rocky gulch, to a severely sloped, and double-tiered, green, Twisted Dune’s Signature Hole is a stern, exciting, and most unique test for any kind of player.
As for the rest of the course, there isn’t a bad hole anywhere. Seriously. Some golf writers often say that about a golf course, but Twisted Dune is absolutely a fun course to play from Start to Finish.
Among the “Best of the Rest” at TD are the back-to-back, and side-by-side 9th and 10th hole Par fives. Straddling either side of the course’s main body of water, the 9th coming in towards the clubhouse and then on to 10 going back out, Nine and Ten provide players two consecutive chances at birdie with very good shots at securing pars.
The long Par Five 12th Hole gives golfers yet another decent chance to make birdie or par just two holes later. Twelve is highlighted by three Irish/Scottish-styled pot bunkers from 70 to 100 yards from the green which must, at all cost, be avoided. If this hole doesn’t make you sort of think you’re playing Royal Portrush at The Open Championship, I don’t know what will.
So, if you get the inspiration to play The British Open like I do every July, or any time of year, and want to play a great links golf course like the course you see on TV, head on down to Egg Harbor Township, stick a peg into the ground and swing away at Twisted Dune Golf Course today.
2101 Ocean Heights Ave
Egg Harbor Township, NJ
609-653-8010
