Pros:
- Wonderful park setting for a course. Good shelters and parking.
- Course plays out and back, basically, wrapping around the shelters and parking lot. Good flow and layout. Well maintained course with managed (but decently thick) undergrowth skirting some fairways.
- Great signage and decent baskets. Good, large concrete tee pads. All done very well.
- Good length variation on this course, which is difficult in just 9 holes. Lengths varying from a couple under 200' to a couple at 360' and one long par 4 at 500+. Hardly ever see that on a nine.
- Similarly, variations in hole type and style. Mostly wooded, but a couple pretty open holes. Short ace runs, deuce-or-die, and a couple where you may want to pick a specific lay-up area to card that 3. Nice.
- To that point, signs have competitive and casual pars listed - and they're both right on. So often community parks just throw a par number at a hole and it really doesn't mean anything, but that's not the case here. Well done.
- #2 is a very cool looking ace run that took me by surprise.
- #4 is a no-joke, tight, wooded par 3 that takes some skill and thought.
- #7 is the par 4, and is almost two holes in one. Open drive for the first 300' followed by a nice 200' wooded tunnel shot if your drive lands in the entry. Good, classic hole design.
- #9 is a great downhill finishing hole that plays a bit shorter than the listed distance.
Cons:
- Really, about the biggest thing holding this course back from being the absolute model of 9-hole courses is multiple pins or pads. Maybe some more landscaping/trimming. That's about it though.
- Really no signature hole on the course, and certainly nothing epic - which is actually normal for 9 holers. A couple memorable ones though.
Other Thoughts:
- In general, I like how approachable this course is for all skill levels. Beginners won't be discouraged, and experienced players will enjoy the hole design and shot shaping challenges, even if they end up scoring very well.
- Among the best 9 hole courses I've ever played (Central Park in Oak Brook, IL really being the only other comparable 9 I've played). Thus it gets the highest rating I've ever given one - 3.5. Multiple pins or pads would probably push it to my max 4.0.