Saga of a Disc Golf Course Restructure - Part 4

The next day, Aaron, Lowell, and I, as well as Gordy, another disc golfer whose been around for years, set out to explore new holes. We started on the east side of the road, where holes 1-3 are located. Looking around, we saw a way of installing at least five holes in the area, though that would make for crossing fairways and too much clutter in one section. Four holes looked feasible though. Satisfied with what we saw on the east side, we made the walk back across the road to scope out the as-yet-unexplored territory. For reference, if you look at the maps from Part 1 of the Saga, it’s the big patch of green to the north of 18, extending up to the area of 16’s tee. A large portion of the available territory isn’t visible on this map either.

As soon as we reached the area, we saw enormous potential. A pathway led into the woods, what looked to be a service road, used and abandoned many decades ago, but perfectly suited to a tight disc golf tunnel shot. The further we explored, the more potential we saw. Meandering through the forest, we found less densely wooded areas that just screamed potential for good disc golf holes. Elevation to play with, enough trees to keep things interesting but not so many to make them frustrating. One of the potential holes we found was essentially a plateau area that was mostly ferns and blackberries. For those unfamiliar with blackberries, they are a thorny fast growing weed that thrives in open spaces and generally chokes out any other plants that grow in the area. For about three weeks out of the year, the plants try to redeem themselves by producing delicious fruit, but for the remaining forty nine weeks, they are a foul, blood drawing, invasive eyesore. They’re no fun to remove–actually, I take that back–one can have an attain an almost sadistic satisfaction from laying into a patch of blackberries with a hedge trimmer and watching a wall of thorns fall before him. Its a hard, time consuming task though, and not many people want to put forth the effort to try to keep blackberries under control. The plateau area we found, as well as other potential holes that would connect with the established course were rife with the plants.

In short, we thought we’d found our perfect solution. We had good length of holes, varied terrain and tree cover, and plenty of blackberries that we could take care of that nobody else wanted to touch. And best of all, it was in an area of the park that was completely neglected. Nobody was using the land for anything else, so disc golfers could play their game without disturbing anyone else, and vice versa. The only obstacles we foresaw were playing too close to the creek and/or playing too close to the neighbors, and the amount of work that would be required to carve out the new holes.

Excited by our revelation, a few days later, we sat down and sketched out a few potential layouts, the prime of which included the new land we’d prospected. We were even able to lay out a twenty-one hole course. When we proposed the layouts to the environmental committee, they seemed very positive about the spaces that we’d chosen. Being unfamiliar with the land though, they wanted to be able to see the area in person, which was fair. So we agreed to show them around on a couple Saturdays to let them see first hand.

They did however, approve the removal and replacement of Hole 9 (the one with erosion issues on the hillside). In exchange for the Hole 9, we were given permission to install a new hole on the east side of the course, so that there would be four holes total there. As soon as we got permission, we set to work on trimming branches, digging paths, and pouring teepads. Though we would be working on the finishing touches for months to come, we were able to fully install two new holes within the span of a week.