1) The strongest thing this course has got going for it is variety. There is a little bit of almost everything here and you're going to need a forehand and a backhand to do well on the woods holes. Hole 1 is a pretty standard park style hole with a moderate gap to hit about 200ft out. Nice and simple, but not too easy, start off to the round. Hole 2 is a long bomber par 3. Even with the downhill it plays about 420-430 to reach the pin. 3 and 4 are pretty wide open but are pretty steep up and then down hill, so they still have some interest. Hole 5 is another 400 foot hole that starts in the woods and plays left to right across a field to a very well protected basket. If you have the power to reach the pin there is great risk reward as a well placed shot will leave an easy 2, but getting just a little bit into the rough can send you straight to instant bogey territory. Holes 6-11 are all very tight woods that twist and turn in every direction and throw in some elevation for some good measure as well. Holes 12-18 all start in a tight tunnel and shoot to an open basket, or vice versa, with a mix of RHBH and straight shots. Even on the holes that are similar in design, they differentiate themselves enough to not get too repetitive. Though, some of the holes are a bit lackluster and many rely on very similar ideas to provide a challenge to the player.

2) Piggy-backing off the first point, where the specific hole design is good it's very good. Tight and technical while still being mostly fair or relatively open with a well placed basket or tee position that still forces you to throw a specific shot. Though, this is not the case on every hole.

3) Tee pads are all good. Plenty large, flat, and grippy.

4) There are restrooms on site in the form of a pit toilet near the parking lot and a port-a-potty near hole 11. They are the conditions/cleanliness you would expect.

1) Navigation can be just a little tricky in places. Specifically the transition from 4 to 5 is a little bit of a distance and takes you right over 15s tee. Though, I recall there being a directional sign here so it's not too bad if you see the sign. Also at 6s basket there's a path that leads off to the right that looks very inviting despite tee 7 being behind you and down a narrow path. There are no signs at this point to guide you in the right place. I went the wrong way my first time here.

2) Tee signs aren't great. They just give hole distances and the recreational par, no hole maps or any indication of basket location. The distances are also generally pretty inaccurate, but that's not uncommon.

3) The woods holes (6-11) are very cramped. All of them have the possibility to interact with adjacent holes on errant shots, some are worse than others. Holes 6 and 7 take a really bad kick to end up on another fairway but 8-11 all could see you right in the middle of another fairway or near a wrong basket on just a slight error. Missing the tee shot left can send you on a B-line straight at 7s tee pad and anything off line of 10 that gets past initial tunnel has a pretty good chance of heading on to 9s fairway or 11s fairway/tee area. The open holes are more spread out but there is still some possibility of ending up on the wrong hole. Number 15 is one of these, as it's a pretty full power shot for most people and 4s tee pad is not very far from the preferred landing zone. Something too turned for RHBH or stalled out LHBH has a very good chance of heading right at 4s tee. **Hole 1 has also been recently moved to get rid of the crossing fairway with 18 but the basket for 16 is very in play for a bad drive. I got hit square in the leg while putting on 16s basket during a tournament from turned over drive on 1.** Lastly, hole 18 has a gazebo and the parking lot very close to, if not inside, circle 1 and is blind off the tee. The first time I played the course there was a couple old ladies just sitting in the gazebo chatting. They were well aware of the existence of the course and were watching out, but with other people this could be a serious safety risk as could the parking lot if the park is busy.

4) On the opposite hand of the first two points in the pros section, the wooded holes, overall, are a bit wonky. They aren't exactly bad, but a couple have some really strange designs or shot shapes that are extremely awkward to try and hit. Specifically, hole 8, 9 and 11. 8 plays straight, under a twisty tree trunk, then at ~140ft turns right into a gap literally 8 feet wide a most and goes down hill to the basket where it opens back up just a little bit. I could see lucking into the circle every once in a while, but there is nothing resembling a clear line here. Hole 9 is a 380ft par 4 with a tight 90 degree dogleg barely 100 feet off the tee and a very small blind landing zone to have a clean look at the ~220ft uphill, barely 10 foot wide tunnel shot toward the basket. The idea of the hole is good, but it's not executed well. I think the hole would have been better served as a par 3 that just puts the tee in a spot that gets rid of the dogleg. Then hole 11 is super short, but makes a wide S-bend with some very tight gaps about 50 feet of the tee that makes the LHBH/RHFH flex shot you need to ever hope of getting anywhere close to the basket not much more than a poke and hope. Any kick, even if you are just trying to lay up, has high risk of sending you into purgatory where carding a 5 on a 230ft hole becomes very much in play.

5) Just continuing on from the last point, less on the hole design and more on the rough. The rough in the woods consists very much of very thick buckthorn. For how grabby and insanely thick the stuff is the tunnels here are honestly too narrow. In the woods holes mentioned just above, specifically 8, just a little clearing would go a long way towards making more enjoyable holes. Two of the open holes that shoot out of the woods (16 and 18) have have maybe 7ft wide tunnels at most for 10-50ft and being off by just 1% will almost always relegate your second shot to just pitching out. The same goes for the holes that shoot into the narrow gaps from the field (13, 15, and 17). Hit the gap, drop in 2. Miss the less than 10 foot gap that's over 200 feet off the tee by a foot and 9 times out of 10 have nothing but a pitch out, sometimes from well inside circle. They aren't bad holes, they are just too punishing. Cleaning up the buckthorn could fix a good bit of these last two cons, and increase the health/beauty of the forest as well. But it's so far gone at this point I don't think they city/county could restore the area to anything reasonable, which is a shame.

6) This wasn't and issue while I was there, but just from seeing the course it's obvious there is massive flooding during rain. There is a large drainage pipe and a visible grassed waterway through a couple of the holes. It looks like the area is designed to have storm runoff from the whole park directed towards it to funnel into into the dry creek bed in the woods by holes 6-12. As tournaments at this course have had to run reduced holes due to flooding, this is definitely not a non-issue. It probably isn't super common, but it's definitely worth noting if you are planning to head here after heavy rains.

**Added info from update on 4/26/2021

One word can sum up Bear Cave Park. Average. Nothing here really stands out from other courses. Ignoring all the cons, I think the layout itself is worth a 3, maybe 3.25, and if the buckthorn was able to be cleaned up in the woods I'd definitely bump the rating up. But as it stands it definitely doesn't deserve it. The course is not bad by any means, it's quite a fun time, and it will offer some legitimate challenge to most players as par averages around 930 rated during most tournaments; the DGCR SSE is decently accurate here. If you in the area I'd recommend checking the course out but I don't think it's worth going out of your way for unless you are just looking to bag as many courses as possible. If you are driving through town down I-90 and just looking for some disc golf mid road trip, I'd recommend stopping at Todd Park the next town over, in Austin, rather than here.

Lastly, as others have noted, there are no bears here (thankfully) and no caves (unfortunately). Some serious false advertising going on here! haha.

18 holes. The course has the land to itself, no worry about hitting a bystander. Holes are challenging.

Holes seem to be in deep woods or open plains. It would be nice if there were a better mix.

For those in the Rochester area, unless you live on the south side of town it is a decent drive to Stewartville.