The Jersey Devil's Delight

First, understand that there are two New Jerseys. North Jersey, in pop myth, is The Sopranos. South Jersey is early Springsteen. South Jersey looks more like North Carolina than like North Jersey. The rolling parkland of Baltusrol is North Jersey. The sandy splendor of Pine Valley is pure South Jersey.

The mood is casual and unpretentious, which is not to say unambitious. The food and accommodations are first-rate, if you know where to go, and the surroundings range from highway honky-tonk to Atlantic City casino glitz, from Victorian gingerbread to Huck-like scenes of kids fishing from the causeways. There are blueberry farms and cranberry bogs. Cedar-stained creeks flow through the Pine Barrens, where, legend has it, the original fork-tailed Jersey Devil haunted the natives and ultimately got an NHL team named after him. The smell of funnel cake wafts along the boardwalk amid amusement-park lights and the twin roars of roller coasters and surf.

"Ah, the Atlantic Ocean," Burt Lancaster said to Susan Sarandon as they strolled down the boardwalk in Louis Malle's Atlantic City. "If you think it's something now, you should have seen it in the old days." There was golf in the old days, but you wouldn't write home about it unless you were fortunate enough to play one of the ultraprivate clubs nestled like diamonds among the pines: Seaview, where the house limousines were Rolls-Royces; the Atlantic City Country Club, where the term "birdie" was reportedly coined and where Walter Travis won the 1901 U.S. Amateur; and fearsome Pine Valley, target golf's ultimate roller-coaster ride. But all that's changed, as a recent building boom has led to numerous outstanding daily fee courses, which pride themselves on offering a country-club-for-a-day experience.

Southern New Jersey Golf

In the last decade top architects including Tom Fazio, Dr. Michael Hurd-zan and Dana Fry, and Stephen Kay have built courses here. At least 200 new holes of daily fee golf have been created, prompting the renovation of some older tracks as well as the building of several private clubs. "Myrtle Beach and Hilton Head have greater quantity," says Kay, "but I challenge any other destination to surpass the quality and architectural variety of golf in the Atlantic City area." Tee times for some (but not all) courses can be booked through the Greater Atlantic City Golf Association (800-465-3222, gacga.com).

BLUE HERON PINES GOLF CLUB, EAST COURSE

600 Odessa Avenue, Cologne; 888-478-2746, blueheronpines.com. Yardage: 7,221. Par: 71. Slope: 135. Architect: Steve Smyers, 2000. Greens Fees: $55-$100.

T&L Golf Rating: ****
The linksy Blue Heron Pines East is a must-play. On over 190 flat and scruffy acres, Smyers carved contours that are as strategically interesting as they are visually pleasing. Forced carries are almost nonexistent, but heroic options present themselves on several holes. Though inland, the course is often wind-strafed, but that is not the only reason to keep the ball low. Subtle slopes and collection areas guide and helpfully carom the low-running shot that properly "rides the contours," as Smyers puts it. Though it is a bear from the tips, high handicappers can be bullish: Recovery is possible from all but the most egregious goofs.

PINE HILL GOLF CLUB

500 West Branch Avenue, Pine Hill; 877-450-8866, golfpinehill.com. Yardage: 6,969. Par: 70. Slope: 140. Architect: Tom Fazio, 2000. Greens Fee: $130.
T&L Golf Rating: ****
Fazio's fairways pour as irrefutably as lava, and his routing imbues each elevation change with strategic purpose. As a result, you get exciting par fours like the sixth and twelfth, daunting doglegs like the par-four fifteenth, ticklish club selections on the par threes and inspirational ascents to a majestically enthroned green on the ninth and a plateau on the eighteenth that caps a memorable and testing journey.