The final round of my weekend trip to Austin was at Delaware Springs Golf Course – a place that I’ve been anxious to check out since moving to Texas!

Delaware Springs is about an hour from Austin and a couple things about the course interested me. First, every review I’ve ever read about this place glowed. Second, and probably more important to me personally, the course was designed by Dan Proctor and Dave Axland.

Proctor and Axland have done some work together through their firm, called Bunker Hill Golf Inc. That firm is responsible for the design and build of Delaware Springs as well as Wildhorse Golf Club and Bayside Golf Club (both in Nebraska). I thoroughly enjoyed both of those Nebraska courses! If you dig a bit deeper you’ll find that Proctor and Axland have worked extensively with Coore & Crenshaw on other projects.

Like the duo’s two courses in Nebraska, I liked Delaware Springs lots! In fact, my only quibble is that the 8th and 9th holes were a bit too “wooded” and could stand to have some trees removed. Other than that you’ll be hard pressed to find something to change.

What you’ll find at Delaware Springs is a well cared for, playable and interesting course that just seems to fall onto the landscape. The course has an address in the city of Burnet, but it is a bit south of town. It is actually located near the airport, in a small community.

I’m not sure if there are plans to build homes around the course in the future, but for now the course has a rustic, country feel to it – a bit like Diablo Grande in California! The front nine has a mix of open and wooded holes while the back nine almost has a bit of a high desert feel to it with cactus beds and brown native grass lining some holes.

On a windy day our group opted for the blue tees which are 70.3/121/6328. While it doesn’t look like the most challenging course on the scorecard there is plenty of strategy to be had here, yet the course played fair in the wind. I thought the green complexes and a few trees in the fairways were the most interesting design features at Delaware Springs. The greens had plenty of break but usually there was a “good” side to putt or chip from.

The best holes at Delaware Springs are probably the 1st and the 13th. The 1st is a short par-5 where you might have to lay up with an iron from the tee depending on the wind conditions (to avoid a creek). That is never my favorite thing on a par-5, but you still can easily reach the green here in two shots. The tricky part of going for the green is that the angle isn’t great and you’ll need to turn a shot from right to left.

The 13th is a pretty par-3 that plays 160 yards from the blues. The green is framed by trees behind the green and bunkers lurk short of and over the green. If the wind is blowing at all then it will be tough to club. Missing short is the best play because of the back to front sloping green.

The conditions were fantastic and for $37 it was a steal! Delaware Springs is city owned and everything was in great shape without much summer stress to the playing areas. I always had nice lies and the greens were as pure as you’ll find without paying $100 for a round. The greens had that fire to them with some trickle.

I’d highly recommend a round at Delaware Springs as it turned out to be a great find – hidden gem status for sure! If you haven’t played here before just try not to get too aggressive from the tee, as that could cause some problems.

Course Pictures (click any picture to scroll through the gallery):