Pros:
Like all highbridge courses, great concrete pads, signs and alt pin placements on every hole. Great scorecards/maps as well. Also like the other higbridge courses, this one is well manicured without being overgroomed, rough hewn from a chunk of the northlands.
Like the other highbridge courses, this course excels at late trouble, carefully kinking the fairway into a tunnel shot or throwing up hills or trees around the pin. Because this course is often more off the tee than TB, WG & BH, this late trouble is more noticeable, both when its there, or in its absence.
This course, as do all the others at Highbridge, embodies a particular aspect of the game: distance, so it helps to compare it to the other ones a bit.
Now, this is not like, wide open stupid distance, aka field distance. I mean relative to its neighbors, this course is relatively less wooded and rewards controlled distance with some less risk relative to reward. On The Bear, Woodland Greens, and most of Blueberry Hill, you feel like you are shooting down tunnels carved in the woods, with some ceilings, but not here. On this course, the trees are not all-encompassing on either fairway, but usually more of a patchy feel, dodging clumps of trees vs walls. I think this is because this course seems to run through more of the old ball golf fairways, now hilly swathes of sparsely treed passages peppered with sand bunkers and lakes.
It keeps it technical, but lets you unleash the hounds a bit. This course has some very nice terrain on it. Amazingly, it feels like there tons of downhill drives, but very few uphill ones, which is truly a testament to the course design. It lets you rip it downhill off the pad, but usually it will throw a patch of nast OB to one side or other, or something quirky like a deceptively steep down/crosshill shot.
Shot placement is key, and with the open fairways in play, wind can and does become a factor here often.
Another bonus is that with the added D, it gives more opportunities for lovely par 4s and 5s that we dont see at the city parks. The distance is good, because you will need it to play some placement golf to squeeze out the occasional 3 on the par 4s, or even just to make par on several of the 3's, many of which are still quite long.
Personally, I am biased towards more technical courses, but this course is still a blast to play and really won me over.
Of all the courses at Highbridge, I think its the most scenic, for all the wonderful hilltop panoramas of the wisconsin countryside. There are benches in place to enjoy the view by several of the tee pads, even a gazebo skeleton at a critical place between two pads.
Cons:
I love the chances to crush it on this course, the challenges it throws at you, but for a course so well designed, it does seem to have a few rough spots. There are some nasty patches of OB on this course, and the shule less under control than on blueberry. This can be annoying and lead to lost discs and time spent searching.
Heres a list of the SPOTS TO AVOID
On hole 2, the trees off to the right can be tricky to spot a disc in, and no fun to shoot out of.
On hole three, about level with the line of trees off to the right, there lies a nasty little marsh that eats discs like crazy. Even after we lost one there the first round, it ate another disc the next round, despite trying to avoid it. So, have a spotter down below, or steer clear.
On hole 7, watch the pit to the left(assuming the lake is usual size), tough to find em in that hillside or down below. Also watch for poison ivy on the hillside. Not much but its there
On hole 9, the swamp is like the Beast's yard from Sandlot. It goes in there, its gonzo. Plus, as we discovered, there are bees and probably sasquatch living in that thick pile of soggy shule, so dont even think about venturing in after it.
Still shoot over it, just be aware of the risk.
Other than that, not too many surprises here.
I am partial to more wooded courses, and feel like this course rewards distance more than accuracy and shot-shaping. It still counts, but if you cant break 350, this course will really push you to get par. Its doable but not easy.
It seems like at places this course uses OB in place of water. As above, some of the patches are kinda nasty for such an amazing course, but I guess the idea is just don't go there, so I understand.
Though the holes here are all good, and several holes, off the tee especially, are wow holes, to me at least there is not quite enough variety here to outweigh the few rough shule spots and still be a 5.
Also, the signs do not have screws to mark current pin placement like on BH, so judging D is sometimes not a given.
Other Thoughts:
Frankly, this may be my least favorite course at HB, but thats like choosing between chocolate and rocky road ice cream. No losers there.
This is a more tiring course to play, almost on a level with Gold. Bringing extra water and some snacks would not be a bad call.