Bayside Resort Golf Club

Bayside Resort Golf Club is Delaware's first Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course, opened in 2005 just four miles from Fenwick Island and featuring dramatic views along the Assawoman Bay coastline. The layout stretches to 7,525 yards and has been voted the best course you can play in Delaware by Golfweek Magazine for fourteen consecutive years.

Bayside Resort Golf Club opened on August 8, 2005, as Delaware's first Jack Nicklaus Signature Golf Course — a distinction that made it the benchmark for upscale public golf on the Delmarva Peninsula and a cornerstone of the Carl M. Freeman Companies' vision for resort living on the state's southern shore. The course was the conception of Joshua M. Freeman, president and CEO of The Carl M. Freeman Companies, who envisioned a state-of-the-art golf community built in harmony with the natural landscape of Delaware's Eastern Shore. Freeman brought in Jack Nicklaus to design the course, with Nicklaus embracing the property's proximity to Assawoman Bay and the surrounding tidal marshlands. The result is a distinctive links-influenced layout that plays across 867 acres incorporating salt marshes, native meadows, and coastal woodlands, with long views toward the bay defining many of the most memorable holes. Nicklaus shaped a course that stays true to the natural composition of the site — strategic shot values arise from the interaction between the open meadow terrain, the coastal wind patterns, and the natural wetland hazards.

The layout reflects Nicklaus's ability to create resort golf that is genuinely challenging for accomplished players while remaining accessible and enjoyable for recreational golfers, a balance that has made Bayside among the played rounds on the Delmarva Peninsula since its opening. The Bayside community has grown around the golf course as its organizing centerpiece, with four resort villages, private residences, restaurants, boutiques, and a resort plaza forming the broader development on the Freeman Companies' land. The course is managed by Troon, placing it within the network of Troon Rewards properties and connecting Bayside players to reciprocal playing privileges at top facilities nationwide. The course sits just outside Fenwick Island, approximately four miles from the Atlantic beaches that draw visitors to Delaware's Quiet Resorts region each summer.

The Assawoman Bay views and the coastal wind that shapes play on the more exposed holes give Bayside a character that differs from the wooded, parkland golf typical of most Mid-Atlantic facilities — a genuine seaside experience within a region better known for beach access than for golf. Bayside's 2005 opening filled a gap in Delaware golf that had long been noted by golf travelers and state residents: despite the coastal resort draw, the state had no course carrying the Nicklaus Signature designation. Fifteen years after opening, Bayside marked the anniversary by cementing its role as the flagship golf destination in Sussex County, operating year-round for resort guests and community members alike.