Avery Preserve DG course is located on the outskirts of an enormous, beautiful park. Here are the main "pros" of the course:

*Fun Holes! Good distance variety and a lot of interesting lines to hit

*Very pretty area. I came here in December and thought it was scenic. There are lots of unique natural features of this course I can only imagine how it must have looked a couple months ago in autumn.

*Water comes into play (kind of)

*Located out of the way of the rest of the park... there is a nice, isolated feeling about this course. You won't have to be mindful of other park users, and you won't have a lot of distractions. Just you, your buddies, the nice scenery and disc golf.

Avery Preserve is an unfortunate case of a disc golf course getting snubbed by those responsible for maintaining it. There are lots of cons:

*There are natural teepads here that are poorly marked, uneven, and with trees behind them that don't allow for good runups.

*There is horrible signage. There is no sign that even acknowledges this course's existence, so unless you read about it here or see it from the road, you will have no idea where to go. Once you are on the course, only a few of the holes have signs, leading to confusion.

*There is so much poop on this course that I found it necessary to mention it here. I don't like it when people don't pick up after their dogs, but I suppose that can also be attributed to the complete lack of garbage cans on the course.

Rant: The people responsible for maintaining this disc golf course should be ashamed of themselves. The park around this course is huge and very beautiful, and it makes absolutely no sense to approve the installation of such a course in such a potentially awesome location without devoting at least a minimal amount of effort in maintaining it. As it is, Avery Preserve is an eyesore to disc golfers and non-disc golfers alike. It does not generate much positive benefit for the community and it detracts from the overall quality of park. With minimal effort (heck just make a sign that says that the course exists for cryin out loud!) the people responsible for this course could make it a positive asset to the park and the community simply by generating awareness. With a bit more than minimal effort (garbage cans, tee pads, hole signs, expansion), this course could attract a lot of devoted disc golfers who in turn could want to further improve it for their own sake, but as it is no avid disc golfer would choose to play here. Unfortunately, if another governing body in the area is debating installing a course, they may conclude from Avery Preserve that disc golf is not a good investment of their funds, despite the fact that it really could be an awesome course.

Properly maintained, I'd give this course a 3 or a 3.5. Expanded (and well maintained), this course could notch a 4. As is, it's nothing more than a practice course.

If you visit this course READ THIS:

*Parking is unmarked. It's pretty much a ditch along side of the road, located right next to baseball fields. Hole 1 is through the trees that are beyond right field of the field closest to the road.

*Once you've played hole 6, turn right 120 degrees and walk. You will eventually get to the tee for hole 7.

- Located near the DuPage River in a small, non-descipt parkland, Avery Preserve combines patches of mature woodland, open grassy fields, and Lily Cache Creek's edge to create a fairly challenging nine-hole course suitable for beginners but catering to more advanced players.
- Good use of the scrubby woodland to sculpt airways (#'s 2, 3, 5, and 8). Hit the lines provided or waste a shot getting out of trouble.
- Good use of water. The river comes into play best on #8, where it lurks to the left of the fairway. Several small trees with low branches wait to kick discs off into the water.
- Good variety in distances. Nothing gets too crazy long, but a few holes approach 400'. Enough short shots to be beginner friendly without becoming cheap or throwaway.
- Decent variety between wooded and open holes.
- Dual tees marked by the typical Chicagoland area old school concrete circles. White designates short tees, while the reds specific longs. Some of the reds were difficult to locate and/or missing.

- Navigation is a bit dicey here. For beginners, the course is completely unmarked. Cross the ball fields towards the stand of trees with the gap in it. Pass through the gap to #1's tee. Compacting the difficulty in actually finding the course is the difficulty in navigating the course itself. Many holes lack any sort of signage other than a pole with the missing placard. Finding #5's basket is especially difficult, with #6's basket seeming to be the likely candidate and #5 tucked away behind a large patch of trees.
- Tees. Rutted in places, nothing more than grass in others. Nothing spectacularly bad, but certainly not good.

- #6 has a couple of old train car bottoms moldering next to the basket. Don't throw underneath them. They've been there long enough for trees to grow between them.
- Avery Preserve has a bit of a secluded nature vibe (the holes next to the roadside notwithstanding), making it a nice alternative to some of the more stereotypical "park style" suburban 9-hole courses.

Good course design. Had good ideas and could have been a fantastic course. Has a good history (boyscout project).

Holes missing, spent quite a bit of time looking for places to park. Spent a lot of time looking for a disc in the intensely thick brush.

I played this as a rather inexperienced player and if I went back now I could probably play it better. Hopefully they'll get missing holes back.

- Pretty even mix of long and short, and open and wooded holes. All of the open holes involve some sort of forest entrance, I think two curve left (more or less), and one goes right. The shorter wooded holes have pretty significant obstacles or a decent tunnel, or a monster creek. Many different challenges are present throughout the forest, mostly straight, with one or two significant curves.
- Two sets of tees on most of the holes provide an extra challenge. I stuck to the whites on my first round, but was able to find most of the reds easily. Some of them, if followed correctly, make a huge, huge difference.
- Great seclusion on the forest side, with good scenery and wildlife. Even though you are close to a highway and right off a road, it can feel like the middle of nowhere.

- Unfortunately, there are missing tee signs and even a missing basket as of 6/26/10. The first hole is just a pole with some sharpie on it, #9 has no sign, and #4 only has a painted pole.
- Navigation could have been tough, but we managed to see the various baskets and signs throughout the forest on the way out, so we knew where to go on the way in, more or less.
- Some tees are right next to the road on the open side of the forest, which is always a bad thing.

- I liked this rugged course, as it offered a lot of different shots. Good distance needed on the long holes, and great accuracy needed on the shorter holes. I see how it could be very, very frustrating to less experienced players, especially if you don't know where to go.
- To find the first pin, there are two things to know. Make sure you are in the gravel lot just to the west of the power lines - no roads or pavement, just gravel. Then head directly west across the softball fields to the opening in the forest, hopefully the pole will still be there for ya.

This is a pretty unique course for the area, and has a totally different feel compared to a lot of the other small multi-use park suburban 9-holers nearby.

The area is disc golf only, and some areas of the course rank among the most scenic I've played. I play here pretty regularly and have seen some cool wildlife due to the seclusion in the back section of the course along the steam.

The course also offers a good amount of shot variety. There's a decent selection of long/short, right/left turning holes. Many shots have red tees that add considerable difficulty to the course.

I have never seen this place have more than three or four groups playing at a time. Usually there is less than that, and often nobody there at all.

Right now this course has two major flaws. First, navigation here is a nightmare. It took me 2 or 3 times coming here to get the hang of it, so if you are by yourself and don't have anybody to ask, you will have problems.

A lot of course reviews on this website will list bugs as a negative and usually I try to avoid that since any place outdoors can get buggy during warmer months, but the bugs at this place are unreal. The river attracts a ton of mosquitoes, flies, and gnats, and the spiders in the brush that line many of the fairways are like something out of Arachnophobia.

Missing/broken tee signs.

The dirt tees and some of the fairways are usually muddy if there has been any recent rain.

This is a tough course, so new players may get frustrated by the tight fairways and the large amount of brush that could easily eat a disc.

As some reviews have mentioned, there is a walk from the parking lot to the first tee (about 300 yards), which is a minor inconvenience, but I thinkl it adds to the seclusion of the course and I don't have a problem with it.

The parking lot is the second on the right once you cross over the I-55 bridge (coming from Weber Rd). It is NOT the parking lot with the big Four Seasons Park sign. It's an unmarked gravel lot in front of some baseball fields. If you see the baskets, you've gone too far.

Despite its flaws, this is an solid place to play a round or two. From a scenery standpoint, it's one of the best plays in the area, but the rundown condition of the tees and signs keep this course rating down. Since it's a nature preserve I doubt concrete tees will ever be installed, but some new tee signs would bump this place up a notch.

The course plays through a flat area with some open space, and some dense brushy woods. The holes play into and out of the woods, testing accuracy on your drive or approach, and punishing errant shots. There is a creek in play on a couple holes, and it adds a cool risk/reward element on this part of the course.

There is a nice mix of shorter reachable holes, and some holes that leave room to air it out but still require control. The woods and surrounding fields were used well to define fairways requiring various types of shots to score well here. A couple blind holes added some extra difficulty throughout the round.

There were two tees on most holes, and the longer set of tees looked like they added distance and difficulty to the holes, and often gave a very different looking shot. There were tee signs at each short tee giving distance from both tees, and hole location. The baskets were in decent shape and caught fine. The grassy parts of the park were mowed, and the entire area was clean and felt taken care of.

The course is not at all obvious to get to. The closest parking lot is the gravel lot by the baseball fields, and you have to walk quite a ways to get to the first tee. If you didn't see where the course was from the road, it's not immediately obvious where to park, or which way to go from the lot.

The course was pretty buggy, make sure to bring bug spray. The tees are natural, and some were not very level or smooth. This made for poor footing in spots, and the long tees didn't look any better. There are only signs at the short tees, so if you're playing the longs you'll end up walking past the tee to look at the sign, then back to the tee (if you can find the markers flush with the ground).

This course is not very beginner friendly, with challenging holes and lots of places to lose discs. It's a great place to challenge your accuracy for more experienced players, and will quickly get you in trouble if you stray from the fairway. I enjoyed the challenge and the variety of this course, better tees and some signage at the parking lot would easily raise my rating.

If you enjoy a challenge, this course has some fun holes that will test different shots. Stop by here and play a round if you're in the area, but it's not a good enough course to warrant driving way out of your way to get to.

They have disc golf baskets!

Lots of sun, Lots of small thick brush, minor walk to the course.

I live in Naperville which is not that far of a drive and I was disappointed that I even came down to play the course. If I lived extremely close to the course I might like it a little better. There are too many other courses in the area to play that are way better. In my mind..... If I was driving by the course I might stop to play but other than that I wouldn't make the effort.