Cape Girardeau: Capaha Park (10 holes)

[legendarydave]

I don't really know HOW to review this since I've only played 8 rounds of DG ever and all of them took place at this course. It is great that Cape Girardeau finally has a course. From reading other course reviews I'm sure many DG veterans would be critical of it: throws near playground equipment, no posted pars, lots of newbies throwing their discs into nearby streets (that would be ME). But I give it a 5 out of 5 for what it has done for the area. Until this opened spring '11 there were NO courses in the area. Now on almost ANY afternoon you will see anywhere between 4 and 24 people playing this course, locals and college students alike. Before this course opened no one sold DG discs, now two local retailers carry a pretty decent variety of discs (bought blizzard champion Katana and Teedevil this week, Buzz SS and Avenger SS last week, and a Gateway Magic putter when I first started) and there are a ton of people who are playing for the first time ever here. I have brought 4 people out to play who had never played before and had a great time every time. Regardless of its rating compared to STL courses or professional ones, it is a ton of fun, has concrete tee boxes and nice baskets (I mean, they SEEM nice?) and a location smack in the middle of town. So overall it is great news for any SEMO students or Cape Girardeau area residents! Maybe after June 1 I can review the SECOND course coming to the area, an 18 hole jawn at Cape County Park.

[Working Stiff]

That's often the ying/yang of these things. It great to see disc golf in Cape and I hope it takes off, but that course is flat-out horrible. Between the playground in the fairway, the holes that shoot back and forth at each other and all the shots over roads and/or where you can easily throw into a road, it's really got to be one of the worst designed courses ever.

When I asked the parks department about it, I basically got the answer that it was all political. The college fronted the cash for the course and wanted it close to campus, so they crammed it into a park that wasn't very well suited for it and they used the design presented by some student who did a project without having any experience designing courses or public parks. Since the college paid the bills, the city was left with very little control over what happened in their park. Very weird.

I've heard that a second course is going in a better site and some point, so hopefully that will give the guys in Cape a decent place to play and the sport can keep growing there.

[legendarydave]

Haha yeah, I just drove one into a pavillion yesterday while I was trying to avoid some other park patrons. Are you familiar with the area, because the new course is going to be at Cape County park which has a LOT less traffic (vehicle and pedestrian) and a ton more space. I don't think the new one would have even been possible without the silly one at Capaha.