An evening of family fun at Kniess' Miniature Golf.

Last night we made our annual trip to .  We have had to skip the past couple of years since my son wasn’t exactly ready to swing a club at anything, but since he is almost 4, we thought we would give it a shot.

Kniess’ has been a fixture in Ross Township for as long as I can remember and way beyond even that!  I have great memories of playing mini golf there when I was a kid (although at that time, we preferred playing at the Putt Putt course that was located on McKnight Rd where the Wendy’s and Denny’s now stands) as well playing a few rounds there with friends or dates during high school and college.  I have always enjoyed the quaint feeling of the course, although on some evening, the bugs seemed to overtake the area.

Years ago, Jeffrey Reynolds purchased Kniess’ and to the delight of many, started to restore and fix up the course.  Through the years, before Mr. Reynolds purchased it, Kniess’ had fallen into quite a state of disrepair.  The area was covered with black asphalt and many of the holes were crumbling and falling apart.  I remember thinking, one summer many years ago, that Kniess’ wasn’t going to be around much longer.

Fortunately, Mr. Reynolds brought Kniess’ back to life.  The black asphalt was removed and was replaced with brick, mulch, and beautiful plants.  He also added several waterfalls, ponds, and a water wheel.  He also kept the holes “handmade” holes on the classic course, thus keeping much of the charm about the place.

We enjoyed our evening at Kniess’ last night.  We did give up on keeping score about half way through.  We also realized that Captain Chaos seems to have more of a natural inclination for hockey than golf.  At least we didn’t lose any of the golf balls. 

Despite our hiatus of several years, the place looked pretty much the same.  My husband did note that water line from the flooding from Ivan was painted over on the main building.  The only negative that I noted was that there seems to be an algae problem in several of the ponds, but I know that algae can be tough to control.  I hope that Mr. Reynolds can find a natural solution to fix that and then bring back the big goldfish!  On a VERY positive note, there were hardly any bugs on the whole course.  We saw one or two lightning bugs and that was about it.  That really surprised me considering it was an especially hot and humid night and we were there at dusk and into the night.

Kudos to Mr. Reynolds for restoring Kniess’ and once again positioning it as a fun spot in Ross Township!  I am sure that he has poured a lot of blood, sweat, and tears into it.  I am also sure that he has spent a lot of money on it as he has battled back from numerous floods.  He has probably cursed Girty’s Run many times.