The Emmitsburg Community Park course is a newer course in historic Emmitsburg, MD that is a welcome addition to the region. Just north of Frederick, MD, the region has an unfortunate lack of courses despite having a lot of open areas and parks where courses could be placed. The course is primarily wooded, though has a few holes that play into open fields or tee off from open fields and throw into small clearings of trees. Due to Emmitsburg being a smaller town, the course will likely not be heavily trafficked.

Being that this is a new course, I hesitate to judge it too harshly as it is not quite done. The overall design is evident, but many of the standard expected features are not complete: tee pads have only been completed on seven or eight holes, signs are small and difficult to see, and navigation throughout the course is difficult.

Despite this, there are a number of qualities that make for a solid course:
-The overall layout of the course is well done. Hole 1 starts with a fun throw from next to the parking lot into the trees with a well-established green. From then on, the front nine largely follows along a walking path, crossing back and forth over the path through the trees as well as open holes in small fields near the park's ball fields. This goes on until the heavily wooded back nine.
-I never felt as if the course was redundant. Just about every hole is unique, with some beautiful highlights along the way. Hole 14 is a fun straight throw slightly down hill 250' to a beautiful green next to a stream. This is followed by a challenging, but highly rewarding hole 15, which is likely the most impressive hole on the course. Weaving through some early trees, the hole opens up after about 100' feet to a wider fairway lined with lush green bushes and trees and finishes 377' up slightly to the left.
-The baskets are in great shape and white, which is easy to see most of the time. This may seem like a small issue, but I put a lot of stock into this basic item and having high quality DISCatchers is always a plus.

The main problems with this course are very much related to it not being complete, but there are some things to consider beyond that.
-Not all the tee pads were finished. They are designed with a rectangle of railroad ties filled with large gravel. I am not really a fan of gravel, as throwing off of loose ground can affect my confidence in my throws. So, even once they are all in, these tee pads may make it difficult to throw from.
-Though there is a fairly accurate map and there were arrows after most baskets pointing to the next hole, the navigation for the course needs some improvement. It did not always follow well with how I expected it to flow. I actually played hole 13 before hole 11 due to a lack of signage and understanding of which tee pad was for which hole (they are quite close together). That said, there are fairly distinct dirt walking paths between holes, so you should eventually be able to find your way.
-The tee pad signs did have small diagrams of the hole with numbers and length, but they were little more than small white stakes in the ground, which can be easy to miss if you aren't paying attention. I expect these are placeholders for now, and larger, more detailed signs will eventually go in.
-The maintenance of the course is lacking. Some of the tee pads, even those finished, were overgrown with weeds that I was having to step on to start my run ups. There were many trees in the middle of fairways that did not seem to work for the design of the holes and the underbrush was high, with a lot of thorns. I nearly lost the same disc twice due to it falling into some trees and the underbrush swallowing it up. The fields on the front nine were mowed well, so some work is being done, but more needs to be done through the woods.
-Playing along the path creates problems when other non-players are walking. I had to wait a few times for people to walk by and get out of range of an errant throw.

As I previously said, the course is not done as of this date. So, if you choose to make the drive, do not expect easy traversability and navigation. Playing the course right now is a lot of work. That said, I do see the course having much potential. The design is intentional and the park is a fantastic setting for disc golf.

I am giving this a 2.0. The cons are too large to give it much better than that at this time, and I really did not have a lot of fun. Still, with regular maintenance, better signage, and better navigation, I could see this course growing into a solid 3.5 or even a 4.0 course. Once these issues have been addressed, I would love to come back and give it another look.