Stafford Lake Disc Golf Course

Stafford Lake Park covers 139 acres of oak-dotted grassland about three miles west of downtown Novato, wrapped around a reservoir North Marin Water District dammed in 1951. Disc golf started here in 1993 as an object course. On September 24, 1997, Shawn Sinclair got the final approvals to put in baskets and tees; the NorCal Championships were played on the new layout that November, and the course has hosted tournaments nearly every year since. Sinclair, Mike "Magilla" Ruzicka and Jim Tobish are the names attached to designing and building it. Three groups keep it running now — local players, the United Flyers of Sonoma club, which handles basket work and concrete tee projects, and Marin County Parks, which mows.

The 18 holes have one or two tees and two to five pin locations each, 60 basket positions in total, so the course can be set short at roughly 5,224 feet, traditional at 6,625, or long at 7,743. The ground is hilly and a full round is close to a four-mile walk, most of it across open grass with clusters of oak to shape the lines — read the wind, because there is little to block it up on the slopes. Concrete tees are in on holes 4 through 7. Entry and parking are free; Marin County dropped its $5 park entry fee across all its parks on July 1, 2023. Park hours are seasonal and the gate can close as early as 5 p.m. in winter, and no dogs are allowed at Stafford Lake Park except service animals.