A couple holes on this course have some pretty cool layouts while retaining good difficulty, specifically 4 and 9 from the red tees. Hole 7 is also an interesting and fun hole from both tees, a right turning hole that starts downhill and finishes with a slight uphill approach (depending on drive placement).

The park is very nice with plenty of camping, only $2 to play all day, beaches on the Bogue Chitto River, a splash pad and horse trails.

Much of the "rough" is actually thick briar or bramble (depending on where you are from) and is largely impassable. When you go off the super long, narrow fairways, you are going to lose discs that you won't want to even look for if you aren't wearing thick pants. This course might be acceptable to play after a control burn (where the forest manager sets fire to all the undergrowth) but the rough kills the fun factor. I kept thinking of a certain Johnny Horton song that was already old when I was a kid about where the British soldiers ran during the Battle of New Orleans. This course is full of that kind of vegetation.

Navigational issues. For example, when you finish 8, you're screwed. There is no clear path to nine and you'd better have decent rough country hiking skills because there are no navigational aids. There is also a conglomeration of holes around a small clearing that are very confusing. And again, there are no navigational aids on the course.

Other typical cons: no permanent tee signs, can't see baskets from tees, no good indication of basket location on tee signs that were present, natural and uneven tees (this will probably get better with more play because there hadn't been enough play to completely wear down vegetation on some tees), long and in some cases unmarked walks between holes (got briefly lost three times).

It's only nine holes but some of the holes are stupid long and several holes are plinko luckfests. You're going to hit trees (and shoot out into impassable rough) because not only are there no defined paths to the basket in some cases (it looks as if very little if any trees were removed for this course), the gaps are very small and the hole might be 800+ feet from the pro tees (and >500 from the red tees). To be fair, the rough isn't that bad on all the holes, just most of them.

There is copious, underutilized elevation surrounding this course that you will have to navigate but don't get to play (it's not severe elevation, after all, this is Louisiana). Elevation, when present is only a minor factor. There appears to have been an attempt to follow some existing trails, so it's difficult to fault layout decisions with the undergrowth issues that were clearly worth avoiding whenever possible.

It's too far away from New Orleans, or even I-12 to make it a worthwhile side trip when Pelican Park is so much easier to get to and so much better and 18 holes, etc.

On the day that I visited the course, the course conditions were listed at "Bad" by the course designer due to the condition of the rough. The problem is, I would have called the conditions "Perfect." It was mowed, the course was dry, what more can you ask for? Well, you could ask for a control burn (see above) but the unbelievably miserable rough is a feature of this course and a "condition" that will probably last from mid-May until the first freeze kills the briars (likely to be in late November or December that far south).

It's not easy to find the course in the park so make sure and get directions from the park personnel at the gate. They will give you a map and directions to the course, but it wouldn't be difficult to miss. Frankly, given the part of Louisiana that this course is in, you are probably very unlikely to find any locals playing it.

This is one of four courses that I have played that I just cannot recommend to traveling players. But if you want to bag this course, go in the dead of winter, hope the briars have died back, wear thick pants and play from the short tees. Otherwise just play an extra round at the excellent course at Pelican Park in Mandeville.