Hazards like no other on Army golf course in South Korea

U.S. ARMY CAMP BONIFAS, South Korea — You stand atop an elevated tee box on the first and only hole of the world's most dangerous golf course.

And you consider your chances.

This deadly little par 3 measures 192 yards but plays more like 250 in the face of the vicious winds that often blow out of North Korea across an exclusive piece of real estate called the DMZ, just a few yards away.

Underneath your feet and off to the right are bunkers. The military kind. To the left, over an 18-foot-high security fence topped by concertina wire, are hazards that make high rough, deep water and dense woods seem like child's play.

Try countless unexploded mines, the very definition of out-of-bounds. One herky-jerky backswing, one snap hook yanked at the wrong moment and ... ba-boom!

A sign nearby drives the point home: "Danger. Do not retrieve balls from the rough. Live mine fields."

"Oh, dear Lord," moans one of your two playing partners, Army Sgt. Mikel Thurman. "You know what would make this play easier? Let's go get the keys and open the bar."

Name honors soldier

The course is called Camp Bonifas. It's named in honor of Capt. Arthur Bonifas, who was axed to death by North Korean soldiers in 1976 during a disagreement over a tree-pruning project along the demilitarized zone.

Built four years earlier, in 1972, the course provides a much-needed emotional outlet for the 50 U.S. soldiers stationed at this lonely outpost without theaters or restaurants. There's no nightlife, unless you count listening to the taunts of the North Korean soldiers stationed just within earshot.

"It's like a Zen garden where we hit little white balls," says Thurman, 41, an Army brat who was born in Seoul.

When they built the course, commanders figured that if they couldn't fit in all 18 holes in the compact camp, they'd compensate by making it difficult. They'd match their skills against one tough little customer they wouldn't soon forget.

Hardy hackers

The result is a layout that slices through dense rows of trees, along a fairway that's a mere 40 yards wide. Forget about playing an iron. This is all wood, baby. Give it your best shot.

"Most golf holes would get boring if you played them again and again," says Sgt. James Meisenheimer, 23, a Kansas City native. "This one doesn't."

For years, when more than 700 Americans were stationed here, the course was kept in pristine condition. (On a U.S. Army base, labor is cheap.)

But as the number of men and military budgets dwindled, the Camp Bonifas tract fell on hard times. The killer course became a cow pasture.

Not long ago, the hardy hackers at the camp gave their course a face-lift, brought in a construction crew to fix the fairway and cleaned up the two sand traps. They shipped in a riding lawn mower from the U.S. and installed AstroTurf on the tee box and green, giving each a greased-lightning tabletop-hard roll like Augusta on a Sunday afternoon.

The soldiers say they're not done yet.

"We're hoping Tiger Woods will come play here and we'll get the money to do a better job," says Command Sgt. Maj. Andres Ortiz.

Maybe he can do what no one else has done: Make a hole-in-one. Even shooting par is rare. And nobody goes looking for lost balls.

Over the years, the course has developed its own mystique. Play alone and weird things happen.

"You see animals," Thurman says.

Like wild boars, Korean tigers and so-called vampire deer. And even something weirder.

"Some guys say they've seen this thing, a man-bear-pig," he says without smiling. "That's what they say."