There are enough public golf courses around Cape Cod (about 40 at last count) that you’re bound to have access to an early tee time. And it’s nice to play at an hour when you can miss a putt without so many people counting your strokes. Cape golfing has to be at its most enchanting in early morning at the Highland Golf Links in North Truro. It’s only nine holes, but you cannot beat the view. The course is set on cliffs overlooking the Atlantic, next to Cape Cod Light. It’s also the Cape’s oldest course, established in 1892, and said to be the closest thing in the East to a genuine Scottish links course, a place of rough moors with thickets of Scotch broom, heath, beach plum, and wild cranberries.

Highland Links, North Truro, 508-487-9201, truro-ma.gov/html_pages/facilities/golf.php, staff in summer from 6 a.m.