Kiawah Island
The site of the 2021 PGA Championship is also one of the world’s great golf destinations—for TOUR players and weekend warriors alike
A serene setting and a sincere test at the U.S. Open
As the crow flies it’s something like 80 miles between Charleston, South Carolina, and Savannah, Georgia, just a small stretch of the more than 2,100 miles of U.S. Atlantic coastline. And yet within that small stretch there’s a lot of history, a lot of beauty, and a lot of golf—an incredible amount of golf, in fact, and much of it world-class. That fact is being underlined this year when the 2021 PGA Championship returns to The Ocean Course at Kiawah Island Golf Resort, less than 25 miles from Charleston. It will be the event’s second visit to the Pete & Alice Dye design, and another fine moment in Kiawah Island’s golf history—a history in which anyone can take part.
If you left Savannah in a boat and headed north toward Charleston, the distance between great golf stops would hardly give you time to take in the scenery, which is as relaxed and as lovely as the best Southern smile. The Landings on Skidaway Island with its five courses, the 29 holes at Haig Point on Daufuskie Island, a whole world of options on Hilton Head and so on until, near the northernmost point of your trip, you’d back off the engines and drift into view of one of America’s great golfing destinations: Kiawah Island.
Like the stretch of coastline between Charleston and Savannah, Kiawah’s dimensions belie its substance. Measuring only 11 square miles, its surfeit of history, beauty and golf (among other recreational activities) is astounding, not least because its natural charms remain so unspoiled after more than 350 years of habitation.
Today it is as lush and green and inviting as ever it was, an island with a river that rolls through cool lagoons, elegant marshland and maritime forests, setting the scene for epic getaways. Those getaways are had via the Kiawah Island Golf Resort, the primary fixture here and a worldclass destination for anyone who loves the game.
Five courses are on offer, and like the island itself these, too, hold plenty of history—especially The Ocean Course (see sidebar: The Ocean Course). The site of the 1991 Ryder Cup—the “War by the Shore”—saw American Mark Calcavecchia convulse in sobs on a beach after halving his singles match with Scotsman Colin Montgomerie—after being 4-up with four holes to play. And it was the setting for one of golf’s great images: a photograph of Germany’s Bernhard Langer, standing shocked after missing a 6-foot putt on the 18th green to hand the Cup back to the American squad, a champion athlete in utter despair as a rapturous American audience bursts into unbridled joy behind him.
More recently it saw Rory McIlroy’s second major victory, at the 2012 PGA Championship. The then-23year-old Irishman shot a bogey-free 66 in the final round to take the tournament by eight strokes over next-closest David Lynn. It was a record margin of victory in the event, besting Nicklaus’ PGA Championship seven-stroke win margin in 1980 (and matching McIlroy’s own eight-stroke margin of victory in his first major, the 2011 U.S. Open).
This year the PGA Championship returns to The Ocean Course for the tournament’s 103rd anniversary, and though the world has changed dramatically since 2012, Kiawah Island’s beauty remains untroubled, just as it has since the island’s earliest beginnings.
Though the world has changed dramatically since 2012, Kiawah Island’s beauty remains untroubled
It was from here in 1670 that a chieftain of the native Kiawah people led English colonists to settle at what would become Charleston, one of America’s most important founding cities. The island was taken by pirate George Raynor in 1699, served as a sanctuary for recovering American soldiers and their families during the Revolutionary War, was seized and occupied by Union troops in the Civil War, and sold for logging in the early 1950s, having spent much of its history controlled by just two or three families. By 1974 it was a resort, and under the current owners (who acquired it in 1993) it has flourished as a formidable and responsible place to enjoy some of the best of what life has to offer.
As mentioned, there are five golf courses at Kiawah Island Golf Resort: The Ocean Course by Pete Dye; Osprey Point from Tom Fazio; Oak Point by Clyde Johnston; Turtle Point from Jack Nicklaus; and Cougar Point, by Gary Player. With each offering its own personality, together the courses make up one of America’s best-sited concentrations of epic golf, complemented by an equally diverse range of accommodations and other activities.
There are a number of getaway options that refer to themselves as “golf resorts” and more than a few that promise escape, but few can deliver on the level of Kiawah Island Resort. The site of a Ryder Cup, two PGA Championships and countless fantastic memories from golfers of all skill levels, is a one-of-a-kind destination for families, buddies, couples, businesses or anyone looking for an ideal port of call. Located in one of America’s most beautiful and golf-rich Southern enclaves, Kiawah stands out for its history, its beauty, its golf, and the memories it promises to any who make the journey—by boat or otherwise. Kiawahislandresort.com