Hidden Creek
Played Hidden Creek in 2013. Hidden Creek is a very under-the-radar club outside of AC at the Jersey Shore. It’s very different than the other offerings down here – it’s much more like Pine Valley than it is Galloway. It’s laid out on a huge piece of property pretty well inland and is a Coore and Crenshaw design and offers a lot of their minimalist philosophy though in a much more wooded setting than a lot of their other work.
Hidden Creek is right around the bottom of my top 100. It has some golf magazine cred’ – Golf magazine put it on its Top 100 the year after it opened and it has been a mainstay on the Golfweek Modern rankings – ranking 87 there in the latest 2020 rankings. The holes are isolated from each other and there are no homes to sully the walk. Conditioning was great and the staff, caddie and other members we encountered were more than welcoming.
It’s part of the Dormie network of courses that include some other gems around the country: Victoria National outside Louisville, Ballyhack outside Roanoke, Dormie Club in Pinehurst, Arborlinks outside Lincoln and Briggs Ranch outside San Antonio. I’ve not played any of these and rarely travel to those areas but am considering the Dormie Network (Hidden Creek) to replace Stone Harbor as a club for the shore since I have a lot of friends already at Stone Harbor and this would give us another option.
To the course. It’s been a while since I’ve played but I found the card. I am guessing we played the middle tees which measure 6,133 yards and a 128 slope. From those tees (and from my score and memory) this is a manageable course for a bogey golfer. I shot an 89 which is good for me. Again it’s been a while and no particular hole stands out though that’s not necessarily a bad thing. You have to carry a lot of fescue from many of the tees but it’s not a brutally long or hard carry. There’s not a lot of water (the hidden creek must really be hidden as in it doesn’t exist) and there are limited elevation changes – though the land is more rolling than other shore offerings, the bunkers all feature fescue lining as either eyebrows at the top or a beard at the bottom, the greens are big and complexes are solid. I parred the number one handicap 12th but I think length is the issue here and from the middle tees it only played 385.
I liked the clubhouse and remember hanging for cocktails where we met several of the members. Unlike my other two faves down the shore – Galloway and Atlantic City Country Club – you don’t have the dreaded greenheads to contend with here. I discuss in other write-ups the AC area, other courses and where to grab nice eats. My ACCC write up is here and my Galloway is here.
Golf Scrapbook 