Pros:
18 Well-conceived holes that provide tasty buffet of DG variety.
• Variety: Very good. Nice balance of open vs. wooded as well as fairway shapes. Wonderful use of trees to force shot-shaping, guard baskets, and occasionally create low ceilings. Reasonable range of distances.
• Elevation: Very good. Varying topography ranges from relatively flat to quite substantial. Used to great effect in a variety of ways; sloped greens for rollaways, drop-offs behind baskets to punish foolhardy approaches, downhill tee shots, uphills,
• Challenge: Very good. Set up to provide a fun yet reasonably challenging round for most players. The yellow (short) tees are quite suitable for rec players, with the white (long) tees are being a good fit for higher level intermediate/low level advanced players. Playing a mix of yellow and white tees should really suit most intermediate players quite well.
• Routing/Nav: Good - Getting to the next tee is fairly intuitive most of the time, but the way the holes are spread through the park and having to cross the park road /path several times during the round somewhat hampers navigating without the map. I applaud their use of tape on basket spokes to point you toward the next tee - simple yet highly effective. The map will save 1st timers a lot of time, but I wouldn't' say it's a must. #9 comes back to start to form two 9 hole loops.
• Fun Factor: Good - Nothing extraordinary, but Spring Valley has a tasty mix of holes that genuinely satisfies my DG sweet tooth.
• Memorable Holes: Good - The low ceiling and tough line on 3 long, the sharpness of the turn on 5 short, 13 long's humbling uphill,14's downhill Ace run, 17 long's water carry,
• Aesthetics: Good - Every bit a nice, pleasant walk through the park, with some nice touches that add eye appeal as well as functionality (e.g. using logs from downed trees to build a retaining wall around the #5 green; fights erosion, funnels you toward the next tee, looks nice).
• Cart Friendly: Yes. A couple steep slopes, but outside of those, very cart friendly.
Cons:
Not many.
• Not quite enough to challenge solid AM1 players and above.
• Equipment: AS OF THE TIME I PLAYED; meh - but there's hope. (See Other Thoughts).
New Chainstars, natural tees (still in good shape), metal stakes for tee markers with distance on the longs (no distances on the shorts). Just don't lose your balance when teeing off and impale yourself falling on a metal stake, 'cause that really adds strokes to your game.
Other Thoughts:
Very solid course that left me thinking the designers really put some genuine thought into it.
• Double retaining wall on # 16: 1st layer up top combats erosion on the green. 2nd layer down below stops rollaways from going in the water.
• Love that you can skip the water carry by playing 17 from the short tee.
• I actually like the fact that they haven't poured concrete... yet. See how the course plays before you make relatively permanent decisions about where the tees should be, because sometines a few feet one direction or anther can make a big difference. Once you pour, it's too late to change your mind. Which leads me to...
• Crappy tee markers. I honestly believe they went with what's cheap & available (yet fairly effective) until they finalize things and pour concrete for permanent tees.
• Even though the park road and walking path can come into play a few times during a round, I honestly feel it was done in about as responsible a manner possible; with clear lines of sight so players can't miss if something's heading their way, and wait few seconds if necessary,
Played the longs once and the shorts once, and really enjoyed both layouts.
BASED ON WHAT IT WAS WHEN I PLAYED IT: I'd give it a 3.25 if I could, but with decent concrete tees and, simple posts (with hole # and distance), and a few next tee signs, this course is an easy 3.75.
While I believe these improvements are coming, I don't feel right giving it a higher rating until they're actually installed.