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| - I'm seriously torn between giving 4 or 5 stars to this course. In a perfect world, this course would receive a 5 star rating but in reality it's much more deserving of a 4 star review...but for the record I'm giving it 4.5 stars.
Fountain Hills is located about 15 miles northeast of Scottsdale. The 18 hole course plays along the city's famous man made lake featuring the world's 4th tallest fountain, which is predominantly featured in the middle of the lake (it goes off every hour on the hour and continues to spray water for 10-15 minutes). Many of the holes play right along and over the water, making this course a serious challenge to even the more seasoned disc golfers out there. Fountain Hills DGC is one of two (the other being Vista Del Camino) courses that makes up the yearly Memorial Tournament that is held each February / early March.
The surroundings and setting alone make this course one of the most beautiful courses in Arizona, if not the US. Unfortunately there are some real set backs to this course that prevent me from giving it a perfect 5 star rating. The lake itself and the surrounding area, with its walking paths...children's play area and benches and picnic tables are destinations for people who live in or visit the Fountain Hills area...even on a Tuesday around 11 AM. To say the least, this course is a recreational course, meaning that the likelihood of getting in a full round (unless it's super early in the morning) is quite low. The weather on my visit here was beautiful...upper 70s to the low 80s and I personally had to skip 7 or so holes due to people picnicking or laying out on the fairways and near the baskets. It's open for non-golfers to enjoy so there's little you can do about people taking advantage of lawn areas (which are well maintained). And interestingly enough, I didn't see any other golfers out.
Another Con about playing here is the lake itself and the water that fills the lake. To say it's disgusting is quite an understatement. The water is actually reclaimed and treated sewage water...yeah, not cool. While the lake from afar is pretty, up-close near the shoreline it's another story. It's sludgy and nasty. So unless you've got some kind of retrieval device for your discs, plan on loosing plastic when playing here. Even if you can retrieve it, I'd seriously carry a plastic bag and keep it separate from your other discs...never know what kind of nasty bacteria is on it.
As for the course itself, I can't give a full account and report of how truly difficult this course is because I only played 10 or 11 holes. I can tell you that from what I experienced, the course has its share of difficult and tricky holes. Obviously many of the holes involving water hazards involve the decision of being safe and getting a par...or taking the risk and being rewarded by it (or losing a disc in the water). Many of the non-water holes involve some long distances and trees do get in the way from time to time. Be sure to "shoo-shoo" off any geese or ducks that might be near the tee pad...they tend to camp out wherever, including right in front of tee pads. I did have some trouble navigating the course as far as what pin to aim for. It was only a week after the Memorial, so I'm pretty sure some of the signs were still up from the tournament. I will say that while there is a "fu-fu-yuppy" sense I get from being in Fountain Hills, the people I talked to were extremely friendly.
I will likely attempt to play here again when I make my next trip to visit Phoenix again , but it's going to be an early morning outing if I want to play with minimal non-golfers. And I only managed to lose one disc...on hole one...figures.
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