Juniper Golf Club, Redmond, OR - Link to review and photo tour

[Rob Rigg]

I think this thread may have disappeared?

For anyone interested, I have a photo essay of Juniper linked below - it is a great course that is very affordable. Harbottle design - very natural layout with spectacular views of the Cascades.

http://www.thewalkinggolfer.com/Juniper_GC.html

[Jeff Doerr]

Rob,

Add my vote as the best value in Central Oregon. Even if you are staying at Sunriver, it is worth the drive up there to play.

[Michael Dugger]

Juniper is one of those courses that may have been a little too "lay of the land"

While there are some strong holes out there, nothing just blows your doors off.

I can well imagine the course was "built on the cheap" but with perhaps a little more dynamite and some additional time spent with the routing, I think this course could have been 2 Doak pts better.
 

[Garland Bayley]

...
While there are some strong holes out there, nothing just blows your doors off.
...

Blows my doors off!

[Rob Rigg]

Obviously not everyone likes courses that are truly natural and just flow with the land. I was really impressed with Juniper - not every hole is really good - the par 3s, 9 & 18 because of the pond are only so-so - but I do think there are a few stretches that are a lot of fun with a few real stand out holes.

4 through 7 is a good stretch - 5 is a really solid hole, with the mound on the fairway and then the long carry over the natural vegetation and high desert on the second.

10 is a great par five with the ridge off the tee, 12 is a fun reachable par 4, 14 & 15 are good holes although a bit similar, 17 is a great long par four - very challenging.

Too each his own, but I think Harbottle did a really good job with the land at Juniper and overall it is a wonderful course for the money it costs to play it.

[Michael Dugger]

Obviously not everyone likes courses that are truly natural and just flow with the land. I was really impressed with Juniper - not every hole is really good - the par 3s, 9 & 18 because of the pond are only so-so - but I do think there are a few stretches that are a lot of fun with a few real stand out holes.

4 through 7 is a good stretch - 5 is a really solid hole, with the mound on the fairway and then the long carry over the natural vegetation and high desert on the second.

10 is a great par five with the ridge off the tee, 12 is a fun reachable par 4, 14 & 15 are good holes although a bit similar, 17 is a great long par four - very challenging.

Too each his own, but I think Harbottle did a really good job with the land at Juniper and overall it is a wonderful course for the money it costs to play it.

Hey Rob,

I suspect the above comments are primarily directed at me

Which is fine.

At the end of the day I think we are both on the same page.  I just can't "get with" the sucking off of every course because it's the politically correct thing to do.  IMHO, that's boring.  We are here to have frank discussion about golf course architecture, and no course is immune.

I threw up a photo shoot on Juniper a few years back and had a lot of glowing things to say about it.  To be clear, I am a big fan.

Hole by hole goes something like this.

#1  Love the cross hazard and subsequent downhill approach. 
#2  Like #1, a dog leg right, but this is an even more blind tee shot (and uphill) and the green is a tough one bunkered left
#3  A good solid mid length par 3.  Good hole.
#4  Probably the coolest hole on the course.  It is the integration of the lava gunk here which I would have liked to see more of on both the back nine and the one shot holes.  Something you mention on your Walking Golfer blog, however, that I cannot agree with is the demand put on the tee shot.  There is little demand for accuracy here.  It is wide as a freeway down short of the cross hazard gunk.  The golfer just needs to hit something around 200 yards and somewhere within about a 60-70 yard swath of turf to have a look at the green.  The greatness of this hole is how the green sets up above everything.  It's a challenging approach
#5  A tough driving hole here, almost too tough.  I'm still not sure after about 10 plays what the shot is.  Hug the fence line? 
#6  To me, Juniper is all about the driver.  It's a fun driving golf course with lots of width and plenty of bounce and roll.  I think the mound near the second landing zone is a cool and unique hazard.  Beyond that, I think this greens complex is ugly and awkward.  I don't like how it is sorta tucked back behind some gunk to the left.  I'd blow it up and start over, a better green makes this a world class hole
#7  Long tough hole.  Lots of room but the second shot must thread a needle.  Much better green than on #6
#8  This hole just sorta puts me to sleep.  Some interesting rolls in the green causes your ball to move about, which passes the John Kirk test, but overall it's just blah....
#9  I like #9.  I think it's a tough uphill approach with difficult bunkers. 

#10 Okay hole.  the drive always kills me
#11 Bunch of really cool lava rock around the tee just calls out for it to be used differently.  I walked up to the top of it once and can envision a really sweet drop shot par 3 into the fairway of the current #11.  Right now this hole also puts me to sleep.
#12 Gotta love the drivable par 4. 
#13 A total snoozer.  Does nothing for me other than afford an opportunity at an easy par
#14 Great view, great tee area, cool bunkers.  One of the best holes on the course
#15 Same for this hole.  Love it.  Great stuff even with a fake pond.  It's really the only time you have to cross water on this course.  I'll allow one of those per 18
#16 a terribly boring par 3.  Not much strategy.  The backdrop is the clubhouse and cart drop area.  It's just dull as can be.
#17 like Rob said, a strong uphill par 4.  Good hole
#18 A fine finisher.  A little quirky but a good way to close nonetheless.

The more I think about it, the more I think the 10th should have been a par 4 and that would have allowed the 11th hole to be a par 3 with a green up where the current #11 tees are.  There is so many really cool lava rock out croppings at Juniper, it just bums me out not a one of them was used as a fearsome hazard a la the lava tube hole at Pronghorn.  This course could be a Doak 8 with better one shotters.   

[Rob Rigg]

Michael,

I think we are on the same page. When I see you write "may have been a little too "lay of the land" - I immediately think that you must have a problem with some of the more natural features that I really liked - eg) the use of mounds, and even some of the rather awkward ways that fairways and angled or hemmed in by the movement of the land - I think #7 was an example of this. You clearly do not have an issue with these features, it seems like you wanted Harbottle to do more with the natural landscape - like on #11, which makes sense, and also on several of the par 3s which I totally agree with. The guy we were playing with said that they were going to put the 11th tee on top of the lava rock but it was too expensive. Since 13 is such a weak hole, maybe they could have used the land differently in the 10 to 13 stretch.

If you look through my reviews, and my thoughts on the courses I play, if I do not like something - I make it pretty clear. eg) The Reserve. I will admit that I am biased towards courses that, IMO, offer something special. Which I believe Juniper does.

I also tend to give a course like Juniper a little bit of leeway because it was a lower budget project and I think Harbottle did a great job designing with the canvas he had to work with. Some things could have been better, but it's a solid track. At the end of the day, the course is a lot of fun to play and a lot less expensive than anything else in the area. If someone offered me Brasada or Juniper - I would choose Juniper in a heartbeat. If someone offered me Tetherow or Juniper - it would depend on my mood.

In terms of #4 - I feel like a solid tee shot is important to set up the second - there is room, although the native grass on the left side makes it look like there may be less over there than there is - "there is a premium on distance and accuracy" because depending on where the pin is located there is an ideal side to the fairway, especially with the little tree that can get in the way - in terms of distance, ripping driver is probably a bad move, so you need to determine what will place you at your optimal yardage to have the right club in. That being said, you are absolutely correct, you can miss and have some sort of shot - although the approach is anything but easy (as you also mentioned).