Secluded course, quiet, wooded. Makes for a nice trek through nature, good workout.

The water hazards on 12 and 13 are avoidable if you know what you are doing. Not for beginners or for anyone that can't control their shots well. The overgrowth on many of the holes is HUGE. Bring a spotter and be prepared to spend a lot of time searching for your disc. Lost of POISON OAK!

18 holes
Shots require accuracy over distance
Shaded from the sun

Heavy underbrush
Heavily wooded
Hole signs unhelpful

This course, like so many before me have said, has potential. It felt as though the designer put tee pads and holes into a forest. There isn't much in the way of guidance to the hole location. There's even less on the location of the next tee. The fairways have thick underbrush, so much so that you could lose your disc even with a great shot. A shot in the rough will mean a lost disc. On the other hand, the placement so deep in the woods makes it feel secluded. I will go again, but I'll make sure to bring a spotter.

Nice design, good mix of technical and some distance. Has a good mix of lines, really does not favor rightys or leftys. The pond adds a nice bit of diffaculty.

Lack of signage is one of the biggest things, finding the first tee was not really that easy,, had to ask a few people before I found it. Distance and pin placement would be nice. There are a few tees that are hard to find after finishing holes, but not really all that difficult with a bit of wandering and some more asking.

This course has lots of potential. Some clearing of the underbrush and brambles, and it could be really great. Really looking forward to seeing how it can be in the future.

This course is set partly in a fairly thick forest area with plenty of trees and thick underbrush and partially out in an open area. The forest area is still very dense in some areas with ferns that hide discs, six foot tall nettles, poison oak and a large variety of trees. The open area is a cross between a meadow and a vacant lot. It has lots of scotch broom and enough smaller trees to keep it interesting. Being a new course, the baskets are new. The teepads are currently natural and were slippery when wet. Navigation is a little dicey. There are some small signs pointing the way but more are needed. The on-line map helped but still we walked in three different directions trying to find # 1 tee. As stated before, there is one hole over water but the average recreational players can clear it. If not, a alternate pad is available.

The course is in it's infancy. Currently, a spotter is recommended on many holes. If the local club can stay ahead of the vandalism, continue to make improvements such as concrete pads, benches and better signage, and if the park department will contribute to the cause by taking care of the poison oak and if the course gets enough play to naturally beat down the nettles and scotch broom, KR can continue to grow and get better. BUT, if the local disc golf population is content to play it like it is, it will remain average.

I'll be back to play this course again sometime. I'll be curious to see what has happened. With some much needed improvements, I'll be happy to improve upon my rating.

- Challenging but not exhausting
- Excellent variety of terrain (woods vs. fields)
- Excellent variety of lengths and shot types
- Pretty good flow; can be followed even without a map

- No hard-surface teepads...yet
- Poison oak & stinging nettles
- Disc-eating ferns and other underbrush
- Some wooded holes are really a crapshoot
- Poison oak (it's worth repeating)

Keizer Rapids Park sits on a swath of undulating terrain on a bend in the Willamette River (although you never actually see the river from the course). About half of the disc golf course is in a thick fern-filled forest of maple, fir, and alder, and half is out in the gravelly open, with scotch broom, cottonwoods, and willows for obstacles. There's one water hazard, which shouldn't be much of a hazard for anyone who can throw 200 feet. A few holes have minor elevation changes, but most of the course is flat.

The holes have a great variety of distances and layouts, although I think many people will find a few of the wooded holes to be a little frustrating. Some of those fairways are very narrow or nearly non-existent, and for most people, there's going to be a lot of luck involved in getting a good drive through there. The good news is that the worst of them (#3, #4, and #7) are fairly short.

While I don't usually enjoy wide-open sections much, I think Keizer's "meadow" holes are different enough from each other to keep it interesting. The pond adds some variety, and a few well-placed trees and shrubs can get in your way. The longest hole, at 460 feet, is not ridiculously long.


Note that the course was first worked on in June of 2009, and baskets were only just installed in July; the teepads are still dirt rectangles marked by simple toe boards. A map is very helpful, but even if you don't have one, you can still follow the course; look for spray-painted arrows and red rocks on the ground.

While lot of work has been done to clear the big plants and small trees that were in the fairways, the underbrush is still very, very thick. Few, if any, of the big sword ferns have been (or will be) removed, and those fronds are very good at hiding discs -- even when you think you made a pretty good throw to the middle of the fairway (this is especially true on #9 and #10). And poison oak is EVERYWHERE. In the open areas, it forms a border around the trees and shrubs; in the woods, it grows as small plants and also climbs as a vine 50 feet up the trees. Hopefully the Keizer Parks Department has plans to eradicate more of it.

I think that some day this will be a 4-star course; it's both challenging and fun, and that's what you want in a disc golf course, right? So I'll give it a "4" for the layout and the nice new baskets, and a "1" for the current rough conditions. (I'll update my review once the brush gets cleared, the poison oak gets sprayed, and the concrete teepads get poured.)

- Brand new Mach III baskets
- Free

- Uneven natural pads
- Thick undergrowth even in the middle of fairways
- Poison Oak and Stinging Nettles are everywhere, including fairways and greens

This course is brand spanking new.