Lovely piece of land - Tucked back off the highway, this beautifully maintained, multi-use park has mowed trails, paved trails, beautiful trees and natural plants. Makes for a very pleasant walk in the park.
Quiet - Despite being beautiful and with various usage options, I have never seen more than a handful of people here at a time. I was able to let my dog run around, no problem.
Paved teepads, long and short - Every hole has a paved long and short tee box.
Hole variety - Despite my beef (below) with hole design, there's no question that there is an excellent variety of shots on this course, including several par 4's which is always a treat.
Signage - Every tee box has its own sign with the footage and location of the other tee box. UDisc seemed to generally agree with the distances on the sign, and I was happy with my shot selection based on the information.
Lost/Found - I lost a disc here once and the grounds people called me. When I went to get it, they had plenty of discs. It's always nice to have people call!
Beginner friendly - The short tees are much easier, making it a pretty good course for those just getting into the sport. I threw a bogey-free round and -9 from the shorts. I had some good shots and some bad shots. I don't play enough tournaments to know my rating precisely, but I'm probably about a 925. (For added context I threw +5 from the longs)

Short tee pads - They're flat and grippy but small. On the < 300 foot holes they're fine. However, this course has several long par 3's and par 4's. A nine foot long tee box is just too short. They're also regularly slightly lifted so starting a run-up in the grass is at best awkward and more likely a tripping hazard.
Disc eating holes - I've only played this course in the summer and early fall, but the number of ways to lose discs on this course is insane. There are swamps, lakes, thick woods, and belly-high grass. Bring a kid along and pay them $20 to spot. You'll save $50 by not needing to replace lost plastic.
Signage - It's a pretty big park and has multiple trails for different activities. To get from the basket to the next tee box, most (all?) holes have a sign with an arrow to the next hole. This isn't always sufficient. (I've never seen anybody write "too many signs" in the con section of any review. Why don't more courses put up an abundance of signage??)
Mostly boring baskets - With only a couple of exceptions, the baskets aren't guarded around the green in an interesting or fair way. It's all fairway work on this course.
Bugs - At the height of summer, the deer flies are so bad that the course is literally unplayable. With the lakes and the tall grass, there are tons of bugs and little garter snakes around. Some bugs don't bother me too much, but I could see it being frustrating for others.
One big loop - Small complaint, but it strikes me every time I play here. I know many courses don't have two 9-hole loops, but this course would be perfect for two loops. It's off the highway, so a commuter could pop off for 9 holes. Or, with the bugs, you could play one loop without going absolutely crazy. The course is long, it took me almost 2 hours to play. With the layout, you're so far away from the parking lot that it's a long walk back to the car if you need or want to bail early.
Course design - I know this is a broad complaint, but I found myself frustrated over and over again with the use of space. Ultimately whoever designed this course had some good ideas and then ruined several holes with things like a tree right off the tee box, sticking a couple random trees in the middle of the fairway so you can't shape shots, putting a wall of trees up, putting disc-eating hazards in the worst possible positions, and generally having things in play that will swat down good shots with an unfair hazard. On several holes I stood on the tee box feeling like I had absolutely zero good options. It was so frustrating, especially on such a beautiful piece of land. On the other hand, some holes were so boring that I found myself shaking my head. Good courses have holes with options, pars that make sense, and reward players for consistently making good shots. You can have tight fairways, tall grass, long holes, whatever. But you can't make it so that my good shot is worthless because I didn't hit a random gap between some trees in the fairway that don't belong there.

I vacation in this area almost every summer. I will probably keep playing this course because it's so, so close. But I will likely bop between the shorts and the longs based on what's more fun and would keep me from losing discs. I would not recommend making a special trip to play this course, but if you're in the area and it's not deer fly season then give it a go.

I always try to answer the question "what would my game be like if this were my home course and played here several times a month?". Honestly? I'm just not sure. Playing the shorts would be too easy, and I think I'd just develop a solid putter and mid-game off the tee. I'm tempted to say that the longs would give me a well-rounded game thanks to the variety of hole sizes and shapes. But I think the things that make me frustrated about this course would add up. Would I really be able to develop a long game if I were constantly manipulating how I was throwing to accommodate for unfair hazards and short tee boxes? Could I throw my approaches with confidence since I know that I'm at the mercy of random trees in the fairway? Could I develop a good variety of putting skills and stances with the wide open greens? And could I develop a rhythm and a sense of the discs in my bag if I were constantly looking for and ultimately losing discs regularly? I think what I would develop is a weird knack for being good at THIS course and then possibly struggling on other courses. It would be like learning a language in a classroom. All the skills are there, but there's a lack of fluency, you know?

I did a hole-by-hole on my phone during my last round because I wanted to make sure I could accurately explain why I feel the way I feel about this course. I thought I might as well share it here. They are mostly brief and play on on my points above.

1L - I think this is one of the most interesting holes on the course. Long but straight with room to shape the shot correctly.
1S - Boring. All the fun is gone.
2L - Disc-eater (tall grass & swamp) with some risk/reward. Can get windy.
2S - Good risk for a beginner with tall grass in play.
3L - Some choice here with FH v BH fairways. Tall grass on the right, water hazard on the left.
3S - Choice gone, but good practice for a FH or a RBH left-to-right drifter.
4L - One of my favorite holes on this course. It's a 250 foot downhill shot right at the basket which is all of 15 feet in front of the lake.
4S - Same as the long but just shorter
5L - Called "Diablo" and for good reason. Par 4. Very tough but I'd say fair. Sharp dog leg right with a swamp at the bend. Either lay up with a BH or throw a 200+ foot FH into the LZ. Nasty rough in play off the tee.
5S - Still a par 4 but 365 feet. Probably a good distance for a beginner. Good fairway but some "WTF why are these here?" trees and some good trees, too!
6L - 200' hole over a swamp. Ace run.
6S - Just shorter.
7L - Par 4. I've lost a couple of discs on this hole. Tall grass and a very tight fairway. Plays like a ball golf hole.
7S - Listed as a par 4, but I'd call it a "par 3.5" Too far for a 2, too short to get anything but a 3 or 4. Feels like the long tee but just a little closer.
8L - This is the first hole where I was like "Why? Why did they do this?" It's an interesting shape overall, but you can't shape a shot to the hole because of trees in all the wrong places. I teed off twice here: I parked it once (just missed the "fairway trees") and then the other one I hit the first fairway tree.
8S - I actually thought the short was more interesting. It removes one BS tree and turns the other one into a fairway splitter, giving you a choice. Fun hole from the short.
9L - Narrow tunnel shot that ends on the right. No complaints.
9S - Same but easier. Good for beginners.
10L - Par 4, dog leg left. This 600 foot monster is ridiculous. You play over a small valley with the other hilltop sitting about 300 feet away, but the trees at the bottom of the valley have branches that make you throw into the hillside. Then there's a tree right off the short tee box about 100 feet in front of the long box which makes it ridiculous to try and shape a low-flying laser under the branches to try and get as high up the other hill as possible. Throwing up and around the corner is completely blind with a ditch in play. Once you get up the hill, there's a spray-and-pray situation with a wall of trees between you and the basket. This hole could be so much better.
10S - Almost all of my complaints from the long are still in play, but that tree that's 100 feet in front of the long box is just off the corner of the short which means you can't really take a big rip off the short box to get up the hill and around the corner. So frustrating.
11L - Disc eater. Field hole where the "fun" is throwing over belly high grass to the basket surrounded by more belly high grass. Ugh.
11S - Shorter but still the grass everywhere. Some big bushes were in play which force you to go high to the left or right, putting the tall grass in play big time.
12L - This hole is ridiculous. 365 feet with a swamp between 300 - 350 feet, a 30 - 40 foot strip of short grass on the near side of the swamp, and then more belly-high grass everywhere else. Those are some pretty undesirable choices. If you can use the small box to get a good rip off to clear the swamp, a spray-and-pray wall of trees is there at 355 feet. Good luck! Literally nothing about this hole is fun.
12S - I think this was 255 feet. So you're closer to the swamp but it's still in play, especially for a beginner. If you have enough arm to clear it then you just have to get lucky past the trees.
13L - This hole looks like #4 at Blue Ribbon Pines: a pretty tight tunnel shot with trees perfectly lined up on either side. It's a long par 3 for a tunnel shot, about 350 if I recall. However, right at the end of the tunnel is a big ol' tree. So stupid.
13S - A more normal tunnel shot with the basket about 40 feet to the left at the end of the tunnel. Fun hole for a beginner!
14L - Shorty (225 or something) flick hole with trees all over the fairway. Uggghh.
14S - Same but shorter. Tree right off the tee box again.
15L - More field-y hole with some spray-and-pray but a wider gap that is playable.
15S - The angle on this makes the spray-and-pray trees into small fairways that give you a choice when you tee off. I liked this one, actually.
16L - Signature hole. Par 4. Plays like ball golf with a big, mowed fairway and tall trees and rough on either side. Beautiful but boring.
16S - Same but shorter than longs.
17L - Shorter hole (225ish). This one plays over a smaller swamp, but there's a tree about 75 feet off the tee box that's just silly. It adds an unnecessary layer of frustration to a boring hole.
17S - At sub-200' and no obstructions, this hole is so boring. The swamp isn't even really in play. If they tied a sharpie to this hole for people to sign the discs they used when they aced this hole, it would be dried out in a month.
18L - Field hole. No obstructions. So, so boring.j
18S - Same but shorter. zzzzzzzz

This is one of those courses that had holes added to existing ones. So it's not really a redesign, just an add on. It used to be 12 holes apparently. It is currently 18. And my lord is this one a thing of beauty now.

Let's start with the tee pads. Two sets of concrete tees on all 18 holes. These are all well done. Brushed, level, grippy. Check,check, check. These aren't your standard alternate tees either. There's a good bit of difference between the two sets. Some holes the the short pad is just fifty feet closer, on others it's 100 feet closer but way off to the right. Well designed, well thought out.

The tee signs are fantastic. At least from the longs. They have all applicable info on them. Hole map showing any OB or hazard areas (usually marsh areas), par, distance and hole number. Couldn't ask for anything more. The shorts I didn't get the best look at, but seemed more basic.

The baskets are Mach III's it looked like. These are either really new or just some of the most durable models I've ever seen. All are in excelllent shape and catch great. Not sure about pin positions, but I'd assume only one.

The course is free to play and looks to be taken care of tremendously. Beautiful park and surrounding area. Scenic views of the lake on numerous holes.

Shot shaping. I haven't played a course that's had this amount of different shot shapes required in a bit. Very well balanced design. I'm talking top tier stuff here. The mix of wooded, open, left turning, tight tunnel, right turning...you get the gist. This course has it all.

The flow of the course is very easy to follow. The design here is top notch. You'd have a hard time getting lost or even turned around at this course. Next tee signs abound everywhere you would need them. And they're present even when it's not needed.

The elevation here was a pleasant surprise. There's not really a dead flat hole to be found. Almost every hole, if not every hole, has some kind of elevation deviation. Some just down, some up, but many that have some of both. This forms some truly unique shots that require going for it and executing perfectly or playing for the intended landing area and getting the par. Risk/reward. Good stuff here.

There's a great mix of distances required too. The majority play in the typical 250 to 400 range but there's some sneaky par 4's that will eat you alive if you get greedy. And there's a 295' tunnel shot that'll eat your lunch if you get greedy. I got greedy. Took a 7. This is a pro. Just not for my scorecard today.

The course doesn't start right by the parking lot. And it ends even further away from the lot.

If you don't like water carries, well, not so much carries. There are some water carries but it's more hitting a landing area or landing in a marsh kind of deal. There's a ton of water in play. Unless there isn't. Depends on the time of year. The course plays very much in a marsh.

So speaking of marshiness. It would seem that this course may be borderline unplayable at certain times due to flooding/water retention issues. Worth noting. And being set in a marsh, I can only imagine that the bugs can get horrendous out here, even by MN standards.

I've played a fair amount of courses in the twin cities area. This one is a must play. There are a handful of better courses but not that many. It's all personal preferance, but In my opinion you'd be hard pressed to beat this course.

It's a bit north of the twin cities proper, but that gives it a bit of it's charm. It's got more of a northwoodsy vibe than some of the more metro gems do. I've played a lot of excellent MN courses, but this one instantly just jumped to the top of them. Personal preferances and all, I'd probably play this one over BRP or VQ. This is a 4 rated course all day, every day. Probably closer to 4.25. It's that damn good.

Is it a must play? Yeah, it kinda, sorta really is. I would go a considerable distance out of my way to play this one. And to make things better. It's not even that far from the 2 top rated courses in MN.

-Concrete pads on each hole, with both short and longs offered.

-Garbages on a decent portion of the holes.

-Great mix of elevation throughout the course. There are some holes on level ground, downhill and uphill throws throughout the course. Very impressed with the use of the elevation out here.

-Great mix of technicality throughout the course, some open holes that add length. Shorter holes generally follow up with tighter lanes as one would want to see.

-Great scenery throughout the course. At points you are overlooking a lake. You even throw a shot down at the lake in which a missed ace run likely ends up in the lake. There are some nice pine shots and pleasant scenery in general throughout the whole course.

-Added 6 holes to the original 12, making this an 18 hole course. I never played the course when it was only 12 but can see the pictures are only from the original 12 and flat out, the additional 6 holes only help increase the caliber of the course we are talking about here. Great course improvement, not just adding 6 holes to make it 18, but adding 6 to make it a sweet 18. Job well done, I believe this was a mission accomplished.

-Bathrooms - located at the beginning of the course, I don't believe there were any options once out on the course so take your deuce at the start of your round or pay the price with a walk of shame while having the rumbly tumblies.

-Groomed Fairways - throughout the course, although some of the newer holes you could tell could use a little bit more cleanup, but that's just being picky.

-Free to play. This is the tier of course that you love so much because it is solid and yet still free. I have paid to play worse.

-Near Town - Resources are close by which is always a plus., this course is right off the highway just west of Cambridge.

-Navigation - good grief please use some arrows to let a guy know where to go next from the basket. Too many courses have this same issue.
IF one of the guys in my group hadn't played the old 12 before we would have spent even more time tooling around, I'm sure. On a few of the new holes and on at least 1 of them we really had to walk blindly in hopes we were going the right direction (at that time it was back tracking up the fairway). We got lucky and it was. Should never backtrack a fairway to get to the next pad imo.

-Walks - In general it did feel that there were several walks to the next hole that if you didn't know your route, only increase your chances of walking aimlessly in the wrong direction for a hundred feet before turning around and going back. This kind of builds off my navigation point above.

-Signage - The new holes didn't have signs. In general the signs that were out here were sufficient, just nothing to write home about. My assumption is all holes will have the same signs eventually but at the time of this review there were not.

-Rough - The rough was fairly wicked in spots, with thorns and I seemed to find a new species of those little stickers that wrap up in shoe laces, socks etc. Never had this particular species but it definitely required picking each one individually off. None of that easy brush off type. In general, though, I'm being picky with mentioning the rough just to have some cons.

I am rating this course a 4.5 because of its ridiculously low current rating (3.1). Using my own rating system, I come up with a strong 4.3 rating on this course, satisfying most of my disc golf thirsts by the end, although not all. Since the current rating is well below my true rating, I always raise my rating to help balance the overall consensus number to what I feel the course really is. Unfortunately, DGCR does not let us elect exact ratings, which I think is a huge drawback so I have to go one way or the other with my own rating. To call this course much short of a 4 would seem very hard, although I could stomach someone calling it a 3.75 due to their own personal taste. I, though, enjoyed almost every hole on this course except for holes 2, 3 and maybe 1 or 2 others that I can't even picture right now. I'd easily drive 30 minutes off path to play this again and I'd even consider going an hour out of my way to play it. Unfortunately, I live over 2 hours away but since I have a friend that lives close by I plan to give this another throw. DO NOT convince yourself that this course isn't worth your time, it officially is and I have a feeling it has been ever since 6 additional holes were included. Nice work Cambridge County Parks, and congratulations to all avid Isanti County Disc Golfer's, you scored a good one here.

Great property, hills, tunnel shots,deep woods and long open holes. Cement pads (2) most holes informative signs and directions, Nice baskets Trash baskets by tees.New holes 8,9,10 are great deep wooded holes. Hole 10 shoots over deep valley to top of hill dogleg left.Half of the course is now deep wooded holes!!

Water!!!! Marsh land and tall weeds off of some fairways # 2 Tall weeds marsh right #5 wet marsh middle of fairway (some new fill) #6 Tall weeds some marsh #12 Big issue Tee from narrow fairway with weeds to 150 foot long super wet marsh to 30 foot dry area basket! Advance player shoots from long tee to marsh Rec player shoots from short tee to marsh You will lose a disc often on this hole! #18 tall weeds right

This is a really nice course with a great design but it needs to be improved with reduction of some marsh areas. Hole 12 bring fill in last 40 feet of marsh to give deeper landing area by basket Tall weeds need to be trimmed thru the season 6 inch weeds ok 3-4 foot not so much Nobody likes to spend a hour looking for lost discs only to go home without!

• Has all the pieces of a good course
• Tee Pads and Signs, Good Baskets, Varity of holes including short technical and longer open shots
• Couple fun shots over creeks and ponds
• Not busy

• Lot of low marshy swampy areas
• Hole 5 in particular requires you to throw through a grouping of trees directly next to some deep wetlands. Hitting a tree anywhere in this grouping will result in the disc getting wet or lost. I don't mind a shot like this if you have a safe area to make it a risk/reward line but going through the trees is the only line.
• There is quite a bit of walking between holes on the back half of the course, there are signs that make it fairly easy to follow

When I played in the spring they recently had a controlled burn of the prairie grass but in the summer when the grass is tall some of the fairways require decent accuracy. Also like I said about hole 5 there are some holes that play over water and have potential for lost discs

Cement Tee Boxes
Nice baskets
Some fun ace chance holes
Nice scorecards at the start

Water - Everywhere. That isn't so bad but the fact that there are no nice ways to walk across it OR in some places even avoid it.
Insane amount of bugs
Very Tall Grass in spots
Long and sometimes confusing walks between holes
Could not find a trash can

There are a couple really fun holes here. Hole 12 was fun, though the basket was bent. Hole 1 was pretty fun so was 8.

But the course to me felt a little disconnected and the parts where you were walking through water or trying to find a disc in water just were not fun. My legs were burning for about 40 minutes after finishing this course.

Granted I am a beginner this coarse may not have been ideal for me.

- This is a diamond in the rough! A course I knew nothing about, nor did anyone I played with! A new course, with not must exposure or so it seemed.
- Great overall quality of the course, in what seems to be a very clean and well maintained park, which also the course itself was excellent and maintained properly.
- Easily to maneuver and find your way hole to hole.
- Map and scorecard located at the beginning for your convenience.
- Fun holes for beginners to experts.
- Practice basket off to the right of the first teepad.
- Walkways and trails through woods are clean and free of debris.
- Played on a beautiful afternoon and ran into just one other group of two, seems to be an unknown course!
- Freshly controlled burned, clearing up all the excess weeds and grass.
- Trash cans keep the course clean, the signage was great for holes as well as pointing you towards the next hole!

- The walk from a few holes seemed excessively long, at least for being just 12 holes.
- I think they could have easily made this a 15 or 18 hole course, a lot of land seemed to be "wasted" in my opinion by having these longer walks from hole to hole. I kept hearing from the group I was playing with, "They should have cart rentals here, this is getting ridiculous!" I can agree but it wasn't the worst thing possible.
- I managed to lose a disc in some nasty mucky swamp water, I am assuming it's only wet and mucky due to the low elevation and the rest of the area around it slopes into a little drainage hole in a sense.
- I am not sure if this would be a con, but I am bummed that this course is so far out of the metro! It was a little bit of a hike to get to and that's a bummer, because this course was a great round of disc golf action!

I really don't know what I could add here besides the fact they should really look into adding 3 possibly 6 holes and make this course top of the line! Anyone who's in the Twin Cities and surrounding area should make an attempt to get out here and throw at least one round, because it's a great change of pace and is a fun course all around! I will have to mark this course down as one I will play again this summer!

Cement Tee Pads.
Nice Baskets-Mach 3-Still with the new "stiffness" however.
Great navigation signs throughout.
Course map and scorecard @ beginning.
Practice Basket.
Funny names for holes.
A few Picnic Tables throughout.
Dual teepads on most holes.

No garbage cans to be seen.

To be honest, even though I have played miggidy-Mackey designed courses I didn't expect much here. I fumbled around these two new courses on dgcoursereview on Friday morning, and as a Cambridge native, I scrambled back to play them this morning. My dad joined me-he lives in the area and at 62 years of age has only played a few (5 or so) rounds in his life. After we played here and the Isanti Middle School, even he agreed that this was a much better, and much funner course to play.

We had a good time from the start. The parking lot has enough size to support 30-40 cars or so-and it seems like this 211 acre park is mostly used for the walking trails. Walk towards the Red sign, take the fork to the left, and about 75 feet away you will find the Disc Golf Course sign. Either snap a picture of the map-or grab a scorecard to keep track of where you are. Navigation was pretty easy throughout, there are signs pointing you in the right direction. There is a spot or two (between 4/5 and 8/9) where you do travel a bit between holes so be prepared for that. In fact, there is a chance that the course is expanded to 18 holes in the future, so take care of it so we can have nicer things.

Hole 1
A tight shot over a dry creek and back up the opposite side to a basket that sits on the edge of the woods. Pretty straightforward if you hit the gap. IF.

Hole 2
A pretty wide open hole that opens up from L to R towards the basket. Slightly downhill.

Hole 3
Another pretty open hole-hyzer friendly for both. The grass on the right (as well as on hole 2) can get a bit thick-I could see some discs becoming lost here. Keep an eye on your shot and keep your disc in the fairway.

Hole 4
A short (200 feet) walk to this teepad and you're shooting back towards Johnny's Lake. Slightly downhill, wide open, the first short hole-and best chance of the first four to birdie. The basket looks to sit close to the lake-but it's about 30-50 feet short of it if you care to run it.

Hole 5
A bit longer walk (300 feet?) through the woods and you come up to 5's teepad. A scorecard described par 5-which is at 500 feet-is almost a true par 4. Most pros would take a 3-but a 4 is a pretty solid score here. This is the first hole on the course that excited me-as you throw through a group of trees, into a small opening, and back up the hill on the opposite side with a shot that breaks right. Fun.

Hole 6
ACE RUN! 200 feet over a depression (swamp? wetland?) and straight away. There is a tree front right of the basket that may block your shot.

Hole 7
Another hole that I had to take a few looks at-just a cool, fun hole. If you play from the long teepad, take a second to walk towards the short to see where the basket is-I would have played my shot differently. The sign shows the basket straight ahead, so I played much more to the left (my shot flew straight) and the basket was a bit more to the right than I anticipated. A bit of length here also, just a fun hole with some accurately placed trees (thanks God!) to make it interesting.

Hole 8
Wide open again, across a shallow valley. Not too much in your way, some longer prairie grass here again. A bit more distance than a typical ace run hole.

Hole 9
Mini Blue Ribbon #4-with a left break at the end. One teepad.

Hole 10
This is where I knew this course was legit. The rest of the course was fun, with a few exciting holes, a few ace runs, etc., but this 600 footer, even though it was a straight shot, showed me that Isanti County was all in for disc golf. Down and back up, with some grass on the right, trees on the left, and a birch in front of the basket make you plan out your shots.

Hole 11
Another fun Ace Run! 155, for me a standstill and throw-across some damp (swampy? wetland?) land. One teepad.

Hole 12
Wide open, kind of a top of the hill shot (but not really) back towards the teepad for hole 2. This basket was bent-maybe it was defective/damaged/or a deer was excited. I hope it wasn't the "V" word that rhymes with candlekism.

Like I said, I didn't expect much and I was very pleasantly surprised. After this course my pops and I played the Isanti Middle School course and this was by FAR the better, more challenging, more well groomed course of the two. I snickered when I read that Mackey suggested that this course could hold a tournament but it's the truth! I also heard they may expand to 18-so let's take care of it. A great course reminiscent of Millstream for multiple lines, pretty wide open shots, slight elevation changes and some wetland areas make for a course worth traveling to. I'd rather group this course w/ Riebbe in Princeton than Isanti, but this has to be East Central Minnesota's premier course at the moment (not including Ray's). After returning home, I already look forward to the next time I get to play here.