At Laurelwood Golf Course in Eugene, you don’t need clubs or a membership. Don’t know the difference between a birdie and a bogey? No worries. Anyone can spend time at this course, set on 90 acres in the Fairmount neighborhood. The nine-hole course is city property, part of Eugene’s municipal parklands, so it’s open to anyone who wants to walk a dog or watch a sunset, then grab a meal from the restaurant, Laurelwood Pub.
Nick Sams runs the restaurant and course alongside his wife, Sadie Sams, and co-owner and business partner Will Benson. “We’re a public park,” Nick Sams says. “Not only do people walk out here, they play golf, walk their dog, take lessons. We’re the place where you can come and spend a whole day walking, dining and golfing.”
Laurelwood opened as Eugene’s municipal golf course in 1929. In the 1960s, the clubhouse briefly served as the second location of a burger joint whose original spot inside what’s now The Paddock once employed a young Steve Prefontaine. During the 1970s it became a storage space. When Sams toured the room, the windows were boarded over with Plexiglas to stop stray golf balls…