This course is tucked into the woods off to the side of a busy road. Holes are short-to-medium length, with one tricky par 4 in the middle. Getting a birdie here is not for the faint of heart- miss your line on one of the tight windows and you'll be scrambling for par or bogey. The shots required are varied enough to have a different feel for each one. For me, the wooded holes are a fun challenge- plenty of trees and rough that isn't super unforgiving. There is a shallow creek that sits along the back of the course, only coming into play a couple of times. The teepads are artificial grass and the baskets are in good shape. Signage is great with next tee arrows on the basket cages. Navigation is straightforward with a logical loop back to the beginning. There's a steady flow of foot traffic. Hole 9 doubles as a quasi-practice basket.

This course lacks a true signature hole. Not much elevation here. The teepads need to be replaced in my opinion, as they are a bit unsafe (I slipped a couple of times during my most recent round). Could use some extra seating and garbage cans. There was A TON of goose poop on the fairways on the open holes so be prepared to wipe your shoes and discs when you're finished. The start of the course is about 500' from the parking lot.

Overall, this is a solid 9 hole course with a decent amount of challenge. It is well maintained and the re-design seems to be an improvement. This will be a fun challenge for beginners and an ideal spot for rec players to hone their accuracy.

- nice tee signs
- high quality baskets
- practice basket
- nice mix of wooded and open shots
- challenging technical lines
- undergrowth very well maintained and cut back
- incorporates water features on multiple holes (creek)
- good, logical flow from hole to hole
- realistic pars

- turf tees can be slippery and at least one had some damage
- bugs ate me alive (though seemed to be more flies than mosquitoes/biting insects, at least)
- not much elevation change to speak of

This was a tough one to rate, and was probably around a 2.75 for me. It just seemed to have that X factor that made it worth the 3 rating.

One of the things I especially like about this course is the DiscGolfPark concept - if you aren't familiar with it, environmental friendliness is one of the main focus points. This course is immersed in nature, with Holes 7 and 8 in particular playing right along Lily Creek. Hole 6 also runs right into the creek after the basket, so you'll want to make sure you don't overthrow.

This course had a nice variety of open and wooded shots and I enjoyed the creek coming into play. Hole 3 in particular was a nice, long wooded shot that will challenge your technical skillset. There are several opportunities here to make or break your score by hitting a tight line through the woods. The baskets were in good shape and the tee signs had a good level of detail. Par also seemed pretty realistic here unlike some other area courses.

Previous reviews complained about the rough/undergrowth. It would appear this course has been overhauled because a lot of this has been cut back and I didn't really have trouble finding discs. There are some tall grass areas but in general, while wooded on many holes, it was open enough to find your disc.

My main complaint was the bugs. Likely due to the woods and proximity to water, they were attacking me relentlessly. I put on bug spray but it was one of the natural ones and seemed to do nothing. Off Deep Woods may be necessary next time I play this one.

The turf tees were a bit slick with morning dew, and concrete would be preferred, but all in all they weren't too bad. At least one had some damage but most were in good shape.

I would definitely make the effort to come back to this one even though its about a 30 minute drive for me. Definitely recommended, and much better than the average Chicago area 9 hole course.

Engaging layout, varied shot shapes, great teepads, signage and baskets. Hole length is good for the beginner, while technicality will intrigue intermediate players. A practice basket for putting, and plenty of open space to warm up before the round.

Missing the "bomber" hole to let one fly, a good bit of mud and standing water in the wet season, lots of geese (and their poop)

I have only played this course once, but will definitely be coming back. My 9 year old loved it, and even had a great throw in through the trees that he'll remember for a while. Holes 3 and 8 were my favorite of the bunch. Course was well maintained when we visited.

Good signage, tee pads and the best baskets I've seen.

It may be playable in the spring but in the middle of summer this course is overall just too difficult and basically unplayable.

It is so overgrown that almost every hole is nearly impossible for an intermediate player to birdie (assuming all par 3) without having had a miracle shot off the tee. That might make for a fun but challenging course but not at Avery. Here most fairways (if there is one) are less than 20 ft wide and the rough is so thick and pervasive that most players are going to be needing multiple rescue shots to get back on track after missing the fairway. If you go off target by just a few degrees and go into the heavy rough (which is EVERYWHERE), you end up with a typically impossible shot because the shrubs are so thick that you can't throw through more than 10 ft of rough in any direction so you have to pitch or roll out sideways or backwards.

This course is too difficult and not fun for those who it was designed for. When the foliage is in full bloom, you need to be a pro here to come close to par and no pros will waste their time with a course like this.

There are way too many good courses within 20 min of Avery to justify coming back here.

NOTE: At the time of writing this review the course still needs tee signs, a green or two isn't cleared, and the teepads have not had sand worked into them. Please keep that in mind while reading the review. I will update the review when these things are completed.

Wow, what a transformation. The original layout was plagued with the classic problems that are common amongst the area's many 9 hole courses. Bad layout, easy/throw away holes, missing signage, missing baskets, natural/poorly placed teepads. This redesign has completely transformed the course into a very challenging par 28 layout. One of the best 9 holers I have ever played.

Pros:

Tee signs-Standard Discgolf Park Tee signs that show the hole, expected line, and location of the next pin. Huge improvement over the DGA/old school plastic signs.

Teepads-Discgolfpark Turf teepads that provide grip in all seasons and weather conditions.

Baskets-Discgolfpark Innova 28 chain disccatchers. Yellow bands look great and make finding the pins on the longer wooded holes much easier.

Course Design: Say goodbye to your standard 9 hole course. This is an extremely demanding course that requires a huge variety of shots in order to score well. There is well developed rough that naturally punishes bad shots. There is also a creek in play on 3 holes that will take your disc if you throw a bad shot.

Difficulty, this 9 hole course is a solid blue level course, even advanced/open players will find challenges on almost every teepad.

Cons:

Long walk to the first hole from the parking lot

A few blind baskets (alleviated by tee signs)

UPDATE: I AM DOWNGRADING THIS COURSE TO A 3.0:
-If it rains forget about playing the course, built in a low lying wetlands and even though it drains quickly it takes a lot of water.

-As a result of the water a few of the tee boxes under the flood line are starting to show some lumps.

-Park District can't figure out how to put sand in the teepads. Coupled with the mud this makes the teeing surfaces pretty tough to deal with.

Overall hopefully the park district can get their stuff together and fix some of the problems.

Overall an extremely fun and challenging 9 holer that makes great use of the land it has. There is even a rumor that it could be expanding to 18 holes!