Disc Golf courses I have known and loved

Looking back through my photos from 2020, I spent a lot of time playing disc golf. This is no surprise to anyone who knows me. Once I’m free of work or family responsibilities for an hour or more, my preferred way to get some fresh air is by walking through trees and parks, hurling brightly colored plastic discs at aluminum baskets along the way. And since this year was one of working at home, needing to keep distance from others, and seeking to balance the mental insanity of checking news with more restorative pursuits, disc golf took on an even larger role in my staying-sane-and-healthy regimen.

Mostly I went to Rosedale, the sprawling park in Kansas City, Kansas, that features an expansive “up top” course in the main park and also a densely wooded “down under” course along the urban hillside. You have great views of downtown, wide open fields, and this year, a lot of helicopter traffic heading to nearby KU Medical Center. My love of Rosedale is also no secret, and it’s an easy place to meet friends or my brother David for a quick round. At one point in the spring I played a quick round over lunch break almost every weekday.

But I did my best to branch out as well, and this post will be a quick tour of 10 other courses I was able to visit and explore this year, almost all of which are within striking distance of the Kansas City area.

Disc Golf “Course” is an imperfect term, as it implies something manicured and finite, while in many cases a course is just a bunch of baskets and tee pads arranged in a forest setting. This was definitely the case for Longview Disc Golf Course in Lake Perry State Park, a well organized course where you will likely see more deer than humans. Lakes (or technically, reservoirs) in Kansas are strange places, resembling lakes anywhere except they are often only around 50 years old, so you get a feeling of being in an old-growth forest while knowing it was likely just fields or farmland a hundred years ago. Doesn’t matter as long as you turn your phone off and are able to tune out the world for an hour or two.

Cedar Ridge Disc Golf Course in Bonner Springs, Kansas, provides a similar experience, though not as expansive or isolated as Lake Perry. The throws are short and ace-able, the course filled with pine, cedar, and oak trees and a large pond at the center of the course.

Cliff Drive Disc Golf Course at Kessler Park is a mix of city and wilderness, snaking along the cliffs and valleys of one of the city’s most scenic roads. I like to play on weekends when the road is open to pedestrians only, though often I abandon playing disc and just take up one of the hiking trails instead. I haven’t had any problems but have run across some sketchy actors here and there, so I’d recommend not going alone on your first visit.

Waterworks Park, just north of downtown KCMO on North Oak Trafficway, has the most brilliant views of downtown. I like to go just at sunset, or in the fall, when the massive sycamores and oak trees are turning. I played here on Monday, Nov. 3, the day before the election, and probably the most optimistic I felt all year, knowing in the back of my mind how messy things were likely to get but choosing to remain naively positive. Walking out onto the green of hole 14 at night (I play with little blinking LED lights taped on the bottom of my discs) is highly cinematic. You’re headed straight toward a large water tower, with the small biplanes and commercial aircraft flying directly overhead into the Downtown Airport in the river valley below. As you get closer to the basket the lights of downtown come into view. If I was a film director looking to capture a unique night scene in Kansas City, I would definitely scope out this location.

Shawnee Mission Park is nice, too. It gets busy on the weekends but is a great place to play at sunset. With tall grasses, high winds, and lone trees dotting the course, it has much more of a wild, Kansas feel than the aforementioned KCMO parks. Though often by the time I drive all that way I opt for a longer outdoor excursion and walk the red and orange hiking the trails instead.

Other parks I played this year include some further afield. In far Western Kansas, the little 9-hole course at Historic Scott Lake is among the most scenic, arid, and unusual. I love the sign warning park visitors to look out for flying discs. It almost looks like code for keeping your eyes open for UFOs. Kansas may be the center of the country, but considering how far it would take for people from coastal capitals (and even Kansas City) to reach this particular spot, it may as well be the end of the world.

In Frisco, Colorado, Doozie and I played the Peak One Disc Golf Course, situated along the shores of the Lake Dillon Reservoir and with surrounding views of the mountains. An extra bonus here is the benches made from old ski lifts.

And at Shepard State Park in Gautier, Mississippi, I found an interesting and experimental placement of baskets along the bayou, including some right by the water and others placed up on five-foot poles. (If you get tired of disc, the park also offers an archery target range).

Other courses I enjoyed include Paradise Point at Smithville Lake, which is actually three courses, all hugging the lake at different points. Though I definitely chose biking in favor of disc in my 2020 visits to this park. Also the newly expanded McLelland Park courses in Joplin, Missouri, set along a scenic hillside in this gateway to the Ozarks (just try to go when the nearby police shooting range is not in session or it will seriously harsh your mellow).

And of course my favorite or at least most accessible course of all, my own backyard.

Happy disc-ing and see you on the course in 2021. Played my first round yesterday, in fact. A bit cold, but had it all to myself.