Farmstead
and
Meadowlands
are situated within a half mile of each other just off Highway 57 in
Calabash, NC.
Because of their relatively remote location, these courses tend to attract a high percentage of local play and
not as much tourist traffic as the more centrally located, more publicized courses on the Strand . But
golfers can translate these factors into advantages. Take it to the bank. Both tracts are worth playing.
Meadowlands and Farmstead are the creation of owner W.J. McLamb, a prominent construction magnate
and land owner in Brunswick County whose family settled there from Wilmington during the Colonial period.
Farmstead can hold its own against any course on the Strand . It is spectacular. It sits on a former tobacco
farm and is largely flat, but designer Willard Byrd transformed the 480-acre site into a magnificent,
windswept course that has all the earmarks of greatness.
The course fairly sprawls over the seemingly boundaryless countryside, offering a consistently
interesting set of holes that twist and turn around manmade ponds and through occasional tree clusters.
Most holes are isolated from the others.
Farmstead gets a lot of publicity mileage from its 767-yard par 6 finishing hole. Granted it is quite
memorable. After all, where else on the Strand can you tee off in South Carolina and putt out in
North Carolina?
But the 18th at Farmstead should not and does not take away from the quality of the entire
track. Farmstead is not gimmicky, there are no goofy berms and other artificial elements that
might give the course a miniature golf course-like flavor. Instead, each hole is carefully crafted
to be eminently playable with largely flat fairways and medium-sized, modestly sloped greens.
Farmstead's greatness is that its design is understated. You finish your round quietly and say
later, "Wow, that was a delightful course!"
Aside from the ballyhoo over the finishing hole, Farmstead's other signature hole is the 192-yard
12th over water and with its multiple sets of tee boxes, allowing for the hole to be set up in
many different ways. Equally outstanding is the 446-yard (392 whites) 2nd hole, a superb
dogleg right from a wooded tee box around trees to a well guarded green. A creek wanders
through the trees along the right side of this gem that usually plays into a prevailing easterly wind.
As of 2004, no property use development plan had been drawn up, leaving golfers the
luxury of playing a course in virtual seclusion on land that has remained undisturbed for generations.
Willard Byrd also put his indelible stamp on Meadowlands, a course ranging from 5,041 to
7,054 yards, that has parkland features. The PUD calls for only 400 single-family homes to
be built in the complex GM Mack Hood calls "pockets of development" in a plan that
is designed to preserve the course's secluded, pristine setting.
Meadowlands is more heavily forested than Farmstead though it would not be considered a predominantly
wooded track. Logically, meadows intersperse with pine clumps, offering a rich natural background
to a course that has a modest number of lakes and one or two slight elevations.
The front nine, as of 2004, had no housing, and as a result, it offers a more secluded setting on
which Byrd designed some truly beautiful holes, some of which are tree-lined. Standing out among
the nine is the 189-yard 8 th hole, secluded among pines with a lake in front of the green and a
front bunker with a high lip that obscures a large section of the green. Standing on the tee box
in the quiet of the morning, with only the sound of the breeze and the warble of a bird, one could
think he or she was in golf heaven.
From Director of Golf Keith Farrell on down, the stated goal of the staff at Meadowlands is to make
your round at Meadowlands so enjoyable you will want to come
back. 
Myrtle Beach Golf
