Few clubs on Cape Cod carry a name quite as spirited as this one, and Eastward Ho! lives up to it. Founded in 1922 and designed by Herbert Fowler — one of the less celebrated but genuinely gifted architects of British golf's golden age — the course stands as one of the most quietly distinguished layouts in New England. Fowler routed it through the salt-scrubbed terrain of Chatham with a restraint and naturalism that has aged beautifully, and serious students of golf architecture make the pilgrimage specifically to see his work here.
Chatham occupies the elbow of Cape Cod, where the Atlantic asserts itself constantly — wind off the water is not an occasional factor but a governing one, and it transforms the course's character hole by hole depending on the day. The landscape is open and links-tinged, with the light and salt air you find at the edge of the continent.
As a private club of nearly a century's standing, Eastward Ho! has the unhurried culture of a place that knows exactly what it is — a serious golf course without pretension, cherished by members and envied by those who haven't managed an invitation.
