Take back the golf courses
They have clubs, but you've got hiking boots
There’s a wonderful new film in theaters this week. Jackass Forever finds Johnny Knoxville and the original crew of MTV’s Jackass reality TV series reuniting at the apex of middle age to perform some of the stupidest and most disgusting pranks and stunts you’ll witness. Cast members are catapulted into furniture store ceilings, locked in a dark room full of mouse traps, subjected to swarms of bees from the waist down, shot out of 30 foot cannons, and at one point, soaked with a choice fluid that comes from a pig and rhymes with “demon.”
There’s an unlikely purity to Jackass that’s been noted lately, especially in this VICE piece from Jesse Miller-Gordon. I grew up watching the show and the earlier films, but these days, what I love about Jackass (besides laughing to the point of bladder failure) is the egalitarianism of the whole operation. Every member of the cast, no matter how famous, is subjected to the worst of the pranks and stunts. There’s a wealth of friendship behind all the bruises and bodily fluids, which actually moved me. And better yet, the Jackass crew will often stage their pranks in posh, snooty environments that are the opposite of friendly and egalitarian. Like golf courses.
You really need to watch the above clip. It’s a beautifully simple invasion of the golf course: a plush, often privatized green space for America’s bourgeoisie, guzzling up water and occupying valuable real estate. There are enormous membership-based golf courses and country clubs in expensive cities that can’t find the political will to build affordable housing or expand their public parks system. If you’ve tried walking on a golf course during spring, summer or fall, you were most likely shooed away by a belabored groundskeeper, and not without reason. An airborne golf ball could dent your dome, chip a tooth, or make it harder to have children. But each winter, in the regions of the U.S. that experience snow and ice, something beautiful happens…
America’s golf courses are temporarily abandoned, and hikers can take them back.
The first time I hiked across a golf course was in 2014. I had decided to spend my quarter-life crisis walking across Massachusetts from Pittsfield to Boston in early December. One raw morning, I found myself on a country road near Acton and I didn’t feel like walking on the narrow shrubby shoulder as cars whipped by. But I noticed something to my left—the immense grassy landscape of the Charter Oak Country Club, unguarded and practically begging to be tread upon by hiking boots. Within minutes, I was wading through sand traps, crossing fairways, and savoring the warmth of the winter sun on my face. There wasn’t a soul in sight. It was me, the golf course, and—as I approached the northern perimeter—the distant bark of some hounds that made me scamper through the woods, back to the road. I’m not sure if this detour was legal, but it transformed my conception of how a golf course may be used when the golfers aren’t teeing off. An empty golf course can yield a lovely hike.
Take Franklin Park, one of Boston’s biggest and most rustling parks, located at the crossroads of Dorchester, Roxbury, and Jamaica Plain. It’s the home of the second oldest public golf course in America—the William J. Devine Golf Course. While it doesn’t boast the gilded exclusivity of private golf courses that cater to the gentry, it’s basically off limits to hikers when golf is being played. But after the leaves have fallen and been stuffed in bags, the golf course becomes a snowbound moonscape where people sled, Nordic ski, or just clomp around. As the Franklin Park Coalition puts it, “Sledding, hiking and cross-country skiing is allowed on the golf course in the winter when the landscape returns to Frederick Law Olmsted's rolling meadow.”
So this week, in the rambunctious, proletarian spirit of taking back golf courses, I offer you three of New England’s finest golf courses for invading…I mean, for winter hiking. Think of this as an appetizer menu. If you’re willing to risk being hassled for trespassing, then you can try hiking any empty golf course where you don’t have to flop over a fence or bring a pair of bolt cutters. But if you’d rather stage your first golf course coup d’etat on firmer legal footing, then consider these three options:
MOUNT HOOD GOLF CLUB (Melrose, MA)
10 miles from the Zakim Bridge, spread across 300 acres of woodlands, the Mount Hood Golf Club connects directly to 2.2 miles of trails that meander through some adjacent forests, fields, and wetlands. Looking south from the golf course, you can glimpse the summit of nearby Mount Hood (259 feet above sea level!) and like Bilbo Baggins leaving his hobbit hole for the Lonely Mountain, you can set off across the fairway and hike to the mountain. Ironically, this recreational area is bordered by the commercial sprawl of Route 1 on the east side. But you’d never know it when you’re slogging across the snowy grounds on one of those ethereal winter afternoons.
PISTOL CREEK GOLF CLUB (Berlin, CT)
Now here’s a golf course that’s already been reclaimed by nature. Pistol Creek used to be a meticulously-maintained golf venue where the carts whirred along winding paths that offer nice views of the Middletown hills. But in 2005, the golf course was closed permanently. The town of Berlin scooped it up later, as developers eyed the course for single-family housing construction (not exactly a bastion of affordable or sustainable housing) and since then, the surrounding woods have slowly subsumed the abandoned golf course. There are still old bridges and clubhouse facilities to be poked around, as well as a ravine that’s located along a path on the western side of the golf course. The eastern side features some impressive cedar and birch trees.
MINGO SPRINGS GOLF COURSE (Rangeley, ME)
If you’re heading to Carrabassett Valley for skiing at Sugarloaf or the Maine Huts & Trails, make a pit stop in Rangeley and try hiking the 3.4 mile loop trail that circles the serene, remote Mingo Springs Golf Course. The loop actually consists of two connected paths (the red and blue trails) which run through hardwood forests past cedar swamps and clearings that offer some really arresting views of Bald Mountain and Rangeley Lake. While these trails are also open during golf season, you’ll likely have the place to yourself in winter. Your only company will be the murmur of the Maine wind (which, by the way, is extremely cold up here.) Given how quiet Maine’s northwestern realm is, you might need snowshoes to hike across the Mingo Springs Golf Course. Packed snow trails require foot traffic that doesn’t happen up here.
In bad news this week, REI—the co-op where many of us buy our hiking gear—is pushing back against a unionization effort being organized by employees at their Manhattan store. I’ll spare you my unabridged thesis on why I think unions need to return with a vengeance if American workers want a viable future, but suffice it to say, the REI employees clearly aren’t happy about their compensation and working conditions. One might think that a business like REI which has branded itself as a progressive leader within the retail landscape (remember the #optoutside campaign against Black Friday?) would be amenable to a union. But of course, it almost never works that way when labor asks management for more power. In a recent podcast, REI’s CEO Eric Artz and Chief Diversity and Social Impact Officer Wilma Wallace started the episode by announcing their pronouns (cool) and acknowledging the indigenous peoples who used to live on the lands from which they were recording (cool) before pivoting to the matter of unions and why REI doesn’t need one (wtf.) So clearly, REI is hoping that its loyal, generally liberal customers won’t notice that it’s trying to squelch a worker-led effort to form a union. If you shop at REI and this doesn’t sit well with you, I suggest submitting a comment at REI’s new dedicated webpage for the union busting effort, and buying your hiking gear at other stores.
If you’ve been inside a lot lately and are feeling that sense of mid-winter atrophy, a jaunt or two on local trails might help. This recent piece for Eat This, Not That! by Alexa Mellardo reminds us that hiking is not only a tonic for stress, but a subtle core workout that can improve your balance. It’s the uneven terrain that helps you achieve this, especially when you’re climbing and descending all those lumpy trails.
Finally, the San Francisco Chronicle reports that Napa wineries are adding hiking trails to their onsite amenities (along with horseback rides and Peloton bikes.) Why? To lure Millennials. Speaking as a Millennial who wrote a book about Millennials and how we graduated into the economic crater left by the 2008 recession, I’d imagine that most of my generational peers are more concerned with trying to buy houses right now. But maybe I’m wrong and living in a bubble. In fact, I’m going to the Bay Area in early March. Should I try a Napa winery trail? Millennial readers, let me know.
Thank you, Miles. You never disappoint me and you surely do brighten up the days. Your admiring, Hope
As ty says to Danny nunin in caddyshack "there's a force in the universe that makes things happen, be the ball danny"