One of our favorite past times is to jump in the car and play new disc golf courses. Having played nearly 100 courses over the last 13 years, we have a few favorites. Two weeks ago, we discovered Nellie’s Course in Renick, West Virginia, just north of Lewisburg. It quickly made it into one of our top three favorite courses.

Nellie’s Course is a private course. We texted the owner to ask if we could play, and he quickly responded, giving us directions for where to park and where the course starts. After driving a few miles down a small country road, we turned into the driveway for a beautiful property nestled against Butler Mountain. We were happy to find a port-a-john available, even more so when we saw it was clean and well stocked.

As instructed, we parked between the barn and the house. There is no fee to play, but they accept donations which we were happy to give. The owners were even kind enough to have insect repellant available. Excited to start, we made our way to the first tee, located between the barn and a silo. The silo was the only mando on the course. The first hole plays around the silo and to the right of the house and yard. I had no problem getting around the silo but did not realize there was a steep drop-off behind it, where I ended up.

After we finished the first hole, we went to the tee next to the basket. This hole played straight up the side of the mountain to a basket hanging from a tree branch. Several of our shots ended up rolling back down the hill. It wasn’t until after we finished the hole that we realized it was an extra hole.

The actual second hole is relatively short, playing down the hill and to the right. It is not a difficult hole, but you could get into trouble if you start rolling.

We were at a loss as to where to find the third hole. I had the course map pulled up on my phone, but it showed the tee right behind the basket, which it wasn’t. After some wandering around, the guys found the third tee across a small bridge over the creek and up a hill. The hole plays up the path to the left with a steep hill on the right.

The fourth tee is just past the basket, so easy to find. It plays back toward the third tee with the basket perched on top of a 10-foot-tall boulder. It is a spectacular hole, with a waterfall behind the basket. The basket is not visible from the tee, making it a difficult shot with no sense of direction or distance. I was pleased to make a bogie on this incredible hole.

Again, we had some trouble figuring out where to go next. We walked back up the hill to the tee, where we could see another basket. Not finding a tee, we shot from the fourth tee. Chris made an incredible par shot, throwing through a narrow gap in the trees and bouncing it off the tree right into the basket. Unfortunately, it turned out that this was an extra basket as well.

When we approached what we thought was the sixth tee, we found a tee marked 5 up the steep hill. It seems that they moved the 5th tee to a less precarious position. The basket is positioned up the hill behind a few trees, with a small stream traversing the fairway.

After the 5th basket, the rest of the course was relatively easy to navigate. The actual sixth tee is to the left of the basket. The only par four on the course, it is a beast playing up the steep mountainside through a narrow path. The basket is tucked behind some trees to the left at the top of the hill. A misthrow on this hole is terrible news, as my score of 7 showed. Even the guys had trouble with this one, both shooting bogies.

Once you play six, the rest of the course is a much easier downhill trek. When we stepped onto the seventh tee, we saw a dove sitting on a nest right in front of the tee. We could easily have touched her as she sat there perfectly still. It is a straight shot to the basket but beware of throwing too far right as the steep downhill slope could lead to disaster.  The basket, adorned with bones, sits just inside the tree line.

The eighth tee, also adorned with skulls, heads back in the direction of the previous tee, creating a V-shape. The basket is slightly downhill and off to the left. My second shot fell short, hitting the trees to the left. I flicked my disc for what could have been an epic par save for me, only to have the disc bounce off the top of the basket and keep going. I ended up shooting five.

The ninth hole plays across a bowl full of trees. A great shot around the bowl’s perimeter would probably work well, but instead, I threw right through the middle hitting several trees along the way.

As we stood on a tee pad at the top of the hill on hole 10, we saw another tee pad sitting in a bowl at the bottom of the hill. As this was marked, we decided to play the lower pad. Throwing out of the bowl requires throwing over an elevated spot; otherwise, it is a straight shot. Hole 10 was one of the prettiest holes on the course, with the meadow bordered almost entirely by Queen Anne’s lace and thistles.

The eleventh hole, with more gorgeous flowers on each side of the fairway, plays down the hill and into the woods, with the basket surrounded by large rocks. If you throw too far right, it can cost an extra stroke to make it back around the bushes to where the basket is.

As we walked through the path of pollinators, we noticed a couple of lounge chairs near the tee for the twelfth hole. It was the perfect spot for them, as the view was spectacular. The tee is at the top of the mountain, with the basket in a corral far below. Joe errantly through too far right, hitting a tree, to find that the tree was on the edge of a cliff. He had landed in the creek at the bottom. Chris threw up and over a massive tree, landing just outside the corral. I threw a beautiful shot down the mountain, but my second shot went severely left, landing on the creek’s edge. I was thrilled it stopped where it did instead of ending up in the water below.

The stream creates a peninsula for the next tee. To the right is the entrance to a cave. The path to the basket crosses the creek twice, playing through the field and ending up at the basket with a sheer rock wall as a backdrop. When we realized the bridge was down, Chris found a path leading up the hill and around the back side of the cave entrance to the field. Navigating the steep, slippery trail was tricky, but I didn’t have to get my feet wet.

After making the basket, you stay on the same side of the creek and follow the wall to the fourteenth tee. It is a short tee pad. You throw over the stream, through a narrow opening in the trees, to the basket sitting in the middle of the meadow. This bridge was also missing, but we found a spot where we could easily hop across the creek. I landed a long shot to make my only par of the day.

According to the map, the fifteenth tee is in the middle of the road. We remembered seeing a tee pad on our drive in near the corral. As we walked, we realized it could not be the right place. So we walked in the other direction, and after some looking, we found a sign marking the 15th tee on the side of the road. We suddenly noticed the tee pad in the middle of the road. We had walked over it several times without even realizing it.

The path to the basket follows the driveway, with the basket sitting on top of a metal cylinder. If you throw too far right, you end up across the fence. If you do, there is an opening to get back there to retrieve your disc. The port-a-john is next to the basket.

The next tee is in the middle of the field across the road from 15. The basket is across the creek, a good distance away. Seventeen’s tee is back across the stream. The basket is back towards the road and sits beside the creek near a swing. The straight shot throws across the creek twice.

The final hole is back on the other side of the driveway and runs along the road. The basket is not readily visible from the tee, as it sits behind tree limbs on the left. There is a gnarly wet area you would do best to avoid, but that’s where my disc landed. As we walked up the fairway, we suddenly felt a glorious, cool breeze emanating from another cave entrance.

It was a glorious day of disc golf. Chris and Joe tied at eight over par. Jenny and I didn’t play nearly as well, but we each had some great shots and enjoyed the day.

We enjoyed the course so much that we played again on our way to Virginia the following week. The grass was freshly mowed, making it much easier to follow the course. In addition, we were pleased to see that they had reset both of the washed-out bridges, making the course a breeze to get around. I scored the same the second time, but Chris improved his score by five strokes.

It took us four hours to play the first game between inadvertently playing extra holes and getting lost. But, knowing the layout, we played the second time in just over an hour and a half.