OSHKOSH (NBC 26) — Josh and Rachel Holz own both mini golf courses in Oshkosh. They took over Oshkosh Mills Adventure Golf this year and worked to renovate and restore the 30-year-old course.
- The mini golf course near the Oshkosh outlet mall was built in the 1990s
- The new outlet mall owners are leasing the mini golf course to Josh and Rachel Holz for at least two years.
- The Holz's also own Glow in the Park Mini Golf on Koeller Street.
Ivan Taphorn is a young golfer who grew up going to the mini golf course near The Outlet Shoppes at Oshkosh.
“I mean mini golf is pretty fun,” he says. “It helps you get better with your putting game.”
Taphorn enjoys playing the sport with his family, and he says it teaches him patience.
“If you ever go mini golfing, have a good mind set, because I am one of those kids that don’t, but my dad is helping me,” he says. “The 10 second rule is you just let out all your anger and then you feel good.”
It’s an experience that wouldn’t be possible without Josh and Rachel Holz.
The Holz’s opened Glow in the Park mini golf on Koeller Street in Oshkosh in 2022. Three years later, the new owners of the outlet mall offered the couple a two year lease of the outdoor course.
“We just saw it as a great opportunity,” Josh says. “Ironically, we were already trying to get into the outdoor mini golf business.”
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Josh says they hope to be able to keep the course open for longer than two years, especially after spending thousands of dollars on renovations.
“This has been around since the 90s,” he says. “It’s a great course but it needed some love.”
They renovated the club house, added an arcade and made improvements to the water wheel and other pieces of the course.
“There’s a lot of cool features on this course that we wanted to make sure we kept and we tried to update and make it a little better,” Josh says.
Josh grew up outside of Disney World and takes a lot of inspiration from the Florida amusement park.
“We’re providing fun,” he says. “You can have a horrible day, come, ignore what’s going on in the world for 30 minutes to an hour and just have a good time.”
With about 30 years of history on the course, the Holz’s say they’re glad to keep the tradition alive.
“There’s a lot of people that have been coming for years and years,” Josh says. “There’s been a great, great positive feedback of what we’ve done…. But also we’ve had a lot of first timers that have lived in the area for 10, 20 years.”
The outdoor course, Oshkosh Mills Adventure Golf, is open seven days a week until Sept. 14, then it’s open Friday-Sunday until winter comes. The indoor course, Glow in the Park, is open seven days a week all year long.
