Donald Harradine designed the first batch of holes in the 1980s, which today makes up much of the front 9. The 18 hole loop was completed in 2000 and unfortunately Harradine had passed on by then, otherwise this would probably be far and away the best course in the area. It's still a very good layout, but lack of design talent on the back 9 - which arguably has even better terrain - hold it back. It appears that the club went for window dressing the yardage book instead of building interesting holes for golfers.

Harradine, of course, made no such mistake. While the opener is a fairly long and uphill par 5, he made sure to get this out of the way early and the following holes are all a lot of fun to play. When the course transitions into the property away from the clubhouse, the first excessively long hole appears at #9, but it is also accompanied by some nice mountain views and, at this point, still dispatched with quickly. Another batch of really good holes follows, including one where the golfer plays right up to an impressive wind turbine and has a short encounter with heathery terrain. However, holes #14, #16 and #17 break the average hitter's back and proceedings change from "exhilarating" to "laborious". Longhitters will of course be tremendously challenged by those holes and might enjoy the course a lot more than the average member.

Nevertheless, for the most part this track is absolutely worth playing, as it has a lot of redeeming factors. It starts with a great set of par 3s that are sufficiently different to create abundant replay interest. Then the terrain and the views are exciting throughout and conditioning is very good, including the recently rebuilt greens. The round also has a good flow to it, even though the loop around the driving range looks awkward on paper, as do the changeover points on the back 9 - but in reality these routing problems have been solved very well. Overall, the Elkofen course will make for a great day out and has everything in place for future improvements.