Rolling Meadows Golf Course
Whitmore Lake, Michigan

Overall Grade: C+
Value: B ($19 - $38)
Walkability: A+
Course Conditions: D
Course Design: C+
Practice Facility: B Practice Green and Driving Range.
Food: C - Gas station cuisine. Ther’s also a picnic area.
Teacher’s Comments: There’s just enough here to make me go back.

Built in 1978 by the Fielek family, Rolling Meadows is a friendly course: friendly to the pocketbook and friendly to the player. It has just enough variety and interesting holes, to get me to go back, in spite of some relatively poor course conditions.

The front nine begins with a short dogleg par four, a short straightaway par four and a relatively easy par three. But don’t give way to disappointment, because from there the holes become much more interesting.

I liked the fifth, a slight dogleg par four that slopes down to the 150 marker and from there left back uphill to the green. Treelines will catch a slice or hook, but a good straight blast will give you a chance to hit a lofted iron that will stick to the sloping green.

The eighth is a 145 yard par three over a depression at an elevated green. The treeline on the left will play on your mind and make you think about staying right. But a large solitary tree there hides sand trap trouble. If you’re not confident in your target golf, aim for the wider area in front of the green and then pitch up and on.

On the back nine, the par five 11th is a lot of fun. Rip a driver off the tee to corner of the dogleg left. Then hit a wood and a wedge straight at the flag.

The 14th probably could be called the course’s signature hole, as it calls for a couple of strategic decisions. It’s a dogleg right par four with a pond guarding the front of the green and light woods on the inside of the bend.

From the tee, you need to decide how close to the right you want to cut your shot. If you can keep it close without going into the woods, you can probably take a direct shot over the pond at the green for your second shot. If you swing it left to the far corner of the bend, though, you may find the approach shot too far for comfort. Laying up short of the pond may be a better decision. I like holes with this sort of risk-reward. 

The 14th is rated as the course’s toughest, but I’d actually vote for the 231 yard par three seventeenth. It’s a downhill shot that needs to be threaded between trees over a pond, while keeping it to the left of a bunker. Madness. (Photo, top left)

Fom the back tees, the course measures 6474 with a slope of 119. The whites are 6048 with a slope of 119.

Course conditions on the day I visited were not so good. Tee boxes were in poor shape , and there were bare spots in the fairways. The greens were all in good condition, though.

Another complaint I had was a lack of yardage markers.

Be sure to bring mosquito spray, especially if you are playing in the morning or evening.

You can see more photos and a course walkthrough here.

Hickory Creek Golf Course

Canton Township, Michigan

Overall Grade: B+
Value: B- ($25 - $47)
Walkability: A-
Course Conditions: B
Course Design: B
Practice Facility: B.
Food: ??
Teacher’s Comments: A likable course that’s popular with leagues. A few boring and short holes mar an otherwise interesting test.

I last played Hickory Creek some ten years ago and remember not being impressed. Conditions were not good, and overall, it reminded me of a cow pasture.

But over the years, I’d heard a lot of good things about the course—especially from people I knew who play in leagues there.

So in the interest of reviewing every course in Washtenaw County, I returned recently for a replay. And to my delight, I found that the course was much improved.

The course measures 6292 from the blues, with a slope of 131 and a course rating of 70.4 That tells you that there’s some trouble lurking on this layout.

Hudson Mills Metropark Golf Course
Saline, Michigan

Overall Grade: C
Value: C ($22 - $27)
Walkability: A+
Course Conditions: B
Course Design: C-
Practice Facility: None to speak of.
Food: C - Gas station cuisine.
Teacher’s Comments: Boring.

The Hudson Mills Golf Course is part of southeastern Michigan’s fabulous Metropark system—a network of parks and recreation areas that includes eight golf courses.

Hudson Mills, located in western Washtenaw county, is a rather dull track. Nearly all of the holes are straight shots from tee to green, with little strategy needed. You simply hit the ball straight as far as you can off the tee, and then take another straight shot into the green.

The course is also very wide open. There’s little danger of losing a ball in the woods or swamp here. I don’t miss a lot of fairways, but when I did, there was no real penalty.

There are a couple of marshes, a few tree lines, some creeks and a pond, but none of them really come into play. In fact, I have a hard time imagining anyone’s ball actually finding these obstacles.

The course measures in at 6,560 with a slope of 118 from the back tees. The whites are at 6,339 with a slope of 116.

Hickory Sticks Golf Course
Ann Arbor, Michigan

Overall Grade: D
Value: D ($15 - $42, depending on time and day)
Course Conditions: D
Course Design: C
Walkability: D ... I wouldn’t try it.
Practice Facility: B
Food: ??
Teacher’s Comments: Don’t bother. There are a lot of better courses in Washtenaw County.

This is a favorite course of a friend of mine, but I can’t for the life of me figure out why. There are plenty of better courses and better bargains in Washtenaw County and southeastern Michigan.

I am sure that designer William Newcomb is not putting this track on his resume. For me, the holes swung between bizarre and uninspiring. Despite the fact that I played well, I just didn’t think the course was a much fun.

Reddeman Farms Golf Course
Chelsea, Michigan

Overall Grade: A-
Value: A+ ($15 - $42, depending on time and day)
Course Conditions: B (some rough spots in the fairway; a lot of ant hills).
Course Design: B+
Walkability: A+
Practice Facility: A
Food: ?? (They’ve got a full service restaurant and banquet area.)
Teacher’s Comments: A very good value. If you’re looking for a golf home, this could be it.

Reddeman Farms is one of the best values in golf in the Ann Arbor area. The course is interesting, but friendly. Fairway conditions are good and the greens are in terrific shape. And best of all is the price. I played 18 walking on a weekday morning for just $19. And I had a lot of fun.

The course is built on a former dairy farm (as so many in the area seem to be) and seems quite far away from the hustle of nearby Ann Arbor and surrounding suburbs (although it is just eight miles west). There’s no housing development here, and the only the faintest sounds of automobiles can be heard. It’s a very peaceful place where you can forget the rest of the world. Appropriately, Reddeman lies at the end of a dirt road past aging barns and working fields.

Reddeman Farms offers good length from the whites at 6,228 yards. All of the greens can be reached by a mid-handicapper in regulation At 6.535 from the back tees, it could seemingly be too short for really big hitters, but the course defends itself well with a good mix of water hazards, bunkers and tight driving holes. I can’t imagine anyone who isn’t on the PGA Tour money list who can reach and hold the green on 18 in two.