Parkside Whispering Pines is Still Close to Great
America's oldest mini-golf course retains a lot of the charm of mini-golf. But issues with cups makes the challenge a lot to bear.
Today I had the opportunity to play America’s oldest miniature golf course, Parkside Whispering Pines. The course located in Irondequoit, New York just outside of Rochester has been welcoming players since 1930.
The course is rather compact and has very little in the way of difficult hills. Water hazards are non-existent.
The most unique hole on the course is Hole #15. On this hole, players must climb a tee box and hit what amounts to a tee shot toward the end of the hole. Instead of turf between the two areas, it’s all grass and you have to play your tee shot from the grass if it ends up there as shown in the photo below.
The trouble with the course however seems to be in its maintenance. Take a look at the photo of this cup on one of the holes.
There were several holes that had cups just like this one. This wasn’t an issue where the course was designed to have a higher elevation as shown on some course, but it was obvious where the cup installation was visible in the surrounding turf. While it’s not aesthetically pleasing, it was an even bigger problem when it came to course playability. It meant that no matter how good your tee shot was, finishing off the hole was often unpredictable as the ball would encounter unpredictable swerves, curves, and deflections around the hole. It was impossible on many holes to get a true read of what the ball was going to do, inflating scores. This course construction issue was extremely difficult for me, a tournament winning mini-golfer, and practically impossible for my five-year old.
Don’t let me deter you from playing the course, however. It is part of Americana and part of the great history of mini-golf. While it may not be a tournament playable course, it could be with some improvements to the cup installation. If you’re in Greater Rochester, head on over and play it.