Atlantic Dunes by Davis Love III

Atlantic Dunes by Davis Love III is a complete rebuild of Sea Pines Resort’s original Ocean Course — the first 18-hole course ever built on Hilton Head Island, opened in 1960. Love and his design team reopened it in 2017 with restored natural dunes, coquina shell and seaside-grass texture, and a par-3 15th that runs right along the Atlantic, one of only two true oceanfront holes anywhere on the island. For the island’s other seventeen courses, see the full Hilton Head golf courses directory.

A Rebuild of Hilton Head’s First Golf Course

George Cobb’s original Ocean Course opened in 1960 as Hilton Head Island’s very first 18-hole layout, and was renovated once in the mid-1990s by Mark McCumber before Davis Love III took it on. Working with his brother Mark Love and architect Scot Sherman, Love rebuilt the holes for modern shot values, restored natural dune contours, and added new sand hills and native plantings — the result was named the National Golf Course Owners Association’s 2018 National Golf Course of the Year, and the course is a certified Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary.

The signature hole is the par-3 15th, played back toward the Atlantic with the deepest bunker on the course guarding the right side of the green — Love raised both the tee and the green here, making an already windy hole even more exposed to the ocean breeze. It’s one of only two holes on all of Hilton Head Island that play directly along the ocean, the other being Robert Trent Jones Oceanfront Golf Course’s par-5 10th at Palmetto Dunes.

Atlantic Dunes, Sea Pines Resort, Hilton Head Island

Atlantic Dunes is on Sea Pines Drive inside Sea Pines Resort, on the southern end of Hilton Head Island — one of three courses at the resort alongside Harbour Town Golf Links and Heron Point by Pete Dye. A Sea Pines gate pass is required to reach the club, same as the resort’s other courses.