- Hole lotta fun -
A golfer shoots a long putt at Illinois Valley Golf Course
Located at the intersection of Redwood Hwy. and Laurel Road in Cave Junction,Illinois Valley Golf Course is a great place to spend time on a sunny day.
Having taken up golf last year, I had yet to tee off at many local courses, including Illinois Valley. So my friend Jeremy, who had played the course, accompanied me as a guide.
The usually wet winter weather had just subsided, resulting in the perfect day to hit the links.
At the clubhouse, one can usually find Michael Day, the head golf professional. As a member of the PGA, Day has golfed all over the world but is rather fond of the great golf available in Cave Junction.
Day describes the I.V. Golf Course as “fairly narrow, not overly long, but a great test of golf.”
“You have to be pretty accurate,” Day said. “You can’t stray.”
Day describes the first hole as a “straightaway par 4.” There’s also a ‘meandering creek’ to cross before reaching the green.
I certainly left my mark on the course, leaving a couple of divots on the landscape, but achieved decent distance on the first tee.
IVGC’s second hole again crosses the creek and takes a hard dogleg left, at an almost 90-degree angle.
Day describes the third hole as having an ‘ever-so-slight dogleg to the left.’
Tree-lined fairways await you at Illinois Valley Golf Course
Eventually, my game began showing signs of steady improvement. In fact, the expletives pretty well stopped at that point.
Putting is challenging at the course, Day said, because all the greens are elevated.
“Because of that, it’s very difficult to roll back onto the green,” Day said. “You’re liable to roll up and roll back down.”
Describing the fifth hole, Day said, “It’s the number-one handicap hole, which means it’s the most difficult.”
Surprisingly enough, Jeremy and I did fairly well on this hole. We made it to the fairway all right, but putting proved difficult.
Hole six is a straightaway. Day said that after the difficulties of hole five, it will “probably give you a nice little reprieve.”
“If you stray to the right, you’ll end up in the pond,” Day said about the water hazard on hole seven.
Day describes hole eight as ‘very narrow.’ Staying on the green is somewhat difficult, he added, while noting that there are more hole-in-ones on this hole than any others on the course.
A creek runs diagonally in front of the tee box for hole nine. Getting past the creek, Day said, is “easier said than done.”
Any experienced golfer would have been quite unhappy with my score, although I was happy to have found more balls than I lost.
Affordability is another nice feature. A round of golf is $15 for nine holes. This summer, IVGC is offering 18 holes and the use of a cart for $25 per player.
For more information, phone (541) 592-3151.
