Pros:
+ Welcome area has a good info board, practice basket with distance markers and a net for warm-up drives.
+ Tee areas have different colored flags for whichever layout you want to play.
+ Plenty of bridges, mulch and other walkway stuff to protect against erosion and soil compaction.
+ The baskets have flags on top for visibility and tape wrapped around a spoke to guide players to the next tee, but...
Cons:
- ...Those baskets are rather old and flimsy.
-/+ Most of the tee pads are anchored rubber. Some people like `em. Some people hate `em. A noticeable few are damaged or lumpy.
- Tee signs are kind of hit or miss.
- The holes start feeling samey and familiar early on.
Other Thoughts:
My favorite fairway to look at was hole7 because it resembled a nice woodsy hallway. I liked playing hole17 because thrown discs have the most room to move around and breathe. I guess I liked hole5 the least not because of how it plays or looks but because of how close it is to Interstate 84. Holes3 and 4 are pretty close to it, too, but hole5 is so close to it that I felt as though I were distracting to motorists. Plus, I had the crazy thought that my throw would ricochet so catastrophically that I would disrupt traffic.
Anyway, Panthorn is a nice option for middling players who want uncomplicated practice throwing in the woods. There are lots of similarly wooded courses out there that shorten their fairways as a way of balancing out the difficulty when the tree cover is this dense. Panthorn is not one of those courses. Players are expected to trust their discs and their throws while working around this course's obstacles and covering as much distance as they can. It strikes me as a course meant for players who are ready for the 'next level.'
It doesn't do much to grab the player, though. After the first few holes, the player realizes that the experience isn't going to vary very much. Whenever I play a course for the first time, I bring along an index card and write little notes about each hole. For most of these holes I wrote, "straight, flat, wide tunnel." Rare is the fairway that turns. Credit where it's due, though: that welcome area is nice. The info board, seating, lost box and practice basket all in one area is a nice convenience. Plus, this was one of the first places I'd ever seen a net for practicing your drives.
But basically, Panthorn is the most disappointed I felt playing a course. I allowed the presentation of the welcome area and hole1 influence my expectations, and when the rest of the course didn't return to that level of delivery, I felt let down. Don't get me wrong. The course manages well on its own, and players who enjoy wooded disc golf will feel happy here. Someone who plays here regularly will develop laser beam accuracy much faster than most. It's the kind of course that forces its players to be better, so that's why it gets a gentle recommendation from me. But if all of those trees and repetitious fairways get under your skin, and you prefer more variety and features in your disc golf, I get it. You're missing out on good training, though...!