The Mini-Golf Diaries

Lilliputt Golf

2010-09-14T05:57:00.001-05:00

Dear Aunt Peg:

Mom says that this course has been in Grand Lake for a really long time. But if you Google minigolf in Grand Lake, this doesn’t come up! You can find it on Google if you already know the name of the course, but just by Googling minigolf in Grand Lake, just the course in Winter Park comes up (along with the 2 courses in Estes Park). She says that’s a real shame because this is a great course. If you know the name of the course, you can find someone’s blog who mentions it, but this course has NO web-presence of its own! You just have to know that it’s there!

This is a course where all the holes have names. I love that. And it is a course that won a “Mechanix Illustrated” award in 1977. Mechanix Illustrated was a magazine that was published from 1928 to 2001. See, they say so in their sign.

This golf course has a “wild west” theme, and contains a shooting gallery! The course, basically, takes up three store fronts on the block - it’s really small. Two of the store fronts are golf, and the third is the shooting gallery. Which, we didn’t see anyone using.

Hey, I love that sign for the pricing for “children shorter than the counter”. And I love that the sign is low, too.

They have really impressive course records. But, the holes are relatively short, and it’s a felt course, so it’s not so hard to get a good score.

They had a good selection of balls - but too many yellow ones!

Oooooh, they’ve got my favorite kind of putters.

This is an old course, you could tell, because the minute we stepped on the course, hole #3 broke down and the lady behind the counter had to come out and do some quick repairs with a can of WD-40 and a screw-driver.

Look!!! A 5 stroke limit!!!

This course has beach umbrellas sprinkled around the course, which was nice, because we played right after lunch, and the sun was very strong. Also, we were playing behind some really slow people, so we had to wait a lot.

This hole had a wrecking ball dipping in and out of the hole, meaning that you had to time your shot.

Look!! There aren’t any SIDES to this hole!! Man!!!

Apparently this course is fun.

HA!!!!!

Another Farmville hole. The barn door swings open and shut.

This is hole number 3 - the policeman rotates clockwise, only he got stuck so he was blocking forward progress. That's why the lady had to fix him.

"Here the fun never sets." That seems to be their slogan.

This is the strangest hole I’ve ever seen! You had to tee up your ball on that little piece of felt on the wood thing, and then putt through Big Bertha. And, this photo also shows how they’ve used space efficiently - Big Bertha goes OVER the next hole!

This hole also had something I’d never seen: you take a one-stroke penalty if you hit the chimes!

Was this plant meant to be part of this hole?

Look at this goofy castle!! It looks like someone’s FACE!!!

This spider lowered down and covered the hole.

I got a hole-in-one on this hole, because it reminded me of the Indianapolis Colts, and you should always get a hole-in-one on the hole of your favorite team!

SHEESH!!!

This is apparently the NBC hole.

HA!!! You know, if I owned this course I might try re-painting that sign.

You were supposed to hit your ball hard enough that you get into the gutter, and then you’d roll down by the hole. See, you have to putt off a cliff.

I wonder how many children hit the ball so hard that it bounces back and knocks them over???

This hole had you putt into a mixing bowl! Seriously, it was the largest hole I’ve ever seen! Once you got into the mixing bowl, you’d come out by the actual hole on the green.

This was the smallest “ant-hill” I’ve ever seen!

And it’s way larger than a regulation-sized hole!!

Here the rocket goes up and down.

This one had a monkey going up and down over the hole, but there are hills on both sides of the monkey, which made the hole really challenging.

The first and only water hole - although there wasn’t any water, only paint. There may have been water in there at some point, but there wasn’t any when we were there.

East 18:
Par: 44
Aaron: 47
Barb: 42

There was also a second half to this course, the "West 18," but it was largely the same as the East 18. It had some unique holes, but the highlight was definitely the second hole. I took a video of it that you can watch by clicking the link below.

Click me to see the video

West 18:
Par: 44
Aaron: 47
Barb: 47

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 3 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 8 balls. This course had extremely fast greens. It’s possible that they weren’t felt, they were just really smashed down astro-turf.

Coming soon: The End of the Tour - for this year!!

Cascade Creek Mini-Golf

2010-08-30T00:31:00.000-05:00

Dear Aunt Peg,

This course is right near Lake Estes, as you’re coming into town from the Big Thompson Canyon. There are two courses here, the Mountain and the Meadows courses.

You can play both courses for $12.00, or one course for $7.00. But, look at this, non-playing golf guests are $1.00, and toddlers with plastic putters are $2.00.

WHAT?!?!? Who ARE these non-playing golf guests???? If they’re not toddlers, who are they????

And, like a lot of courses in tourist areas, you can pay for two courses, but play them on two different days.

They had a practice green - astro-turf. OK quality. They also had water falls.

And they’re not BLUE!!! That looks lovely!!

We played the Meadows course. The fairways all had brick sides, but they weren’t particularly bouncy. The fairways were really lumpy - they were long and hilly. Dad liked how they put this fake rock here to house the light fixture.

I always like when they have fake rocks that have speakers. That just makes me laugh. Yep, this looks like a lot of long and lumpy holes.

Mom liked the score-card holders. She also thought it was really interesting how, even the sidewalks were lumpy at this course! They had speed bumps on all the sidewalks! It was like they couldn’t figure out how to make the greens lumpy without making the sidewalk lumpy too.

Weird.

This course had a lot of signs telling you what not to do. This is why we took whatever liberties we could think of.

In this course, the variation between holes is just the variation in lumps!

Look at the lovely scenery!!!

This hole had a gap, like some we’d seen. But you could also just putt around the gap, which I found odd.

I think it looks like a sleeping face!!!

Look!! Aaron is getting really good at capturing images of balls in mid-air!!!

Man, that is a really skinny fairway!!! (Barb just told me that this is a hole where you could actually go out into the river and get washed back onto the green. Aaron and Paul got holes-in-ones on this hole by putting into the water.)

This isn’t really sand. It’s just a textured rubber mat.

This is the first hole that I think was meant to look like something. It’s easier to see on the drawing of the hole - it looks like a sea-monster!!

WAY cool!!!

I think this was supposed to look like a guy who had just had brain surgery.

WHOA!!! Maybe it’s a guy wearing a yarmulke!!!

Here’s a close-up of the lumpy sidewalk.

Those black things are, like, non-slip strips for the bath-tubs of the elderly!

Dad has a weird putting style - I told him he was choking up too much, but he liked his style.

This was the only multi-tiered hole on the course.

OOoooooh!!! Look at the cool cave!!!!! With train tracks!!!

Dad was amazed that there was no “keep off the tracks” sign, so he stepped on them!

This was the ball-return hole. The elevated hole gives you a hole-in-one on your score card and a free game, but if you went in one of the other holes you got a 2. You started by putting through the logs.

Par: 40
Aaron: 42
Barb: 47
Paul: 50

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 2.5 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 8 balls. It was a really interesting course - I think it would be hard for little kids on account of all the really long and lumpy holes.

Coming soon: Lilliputt Golf in Grand Lake, Colorado

Mr. Mitchell’s Tiny Town Golf

2010-08-24T02:06:00.002-05:00

Note: For this entry, the BLACK text is Aaron speaking. The PINK text is Aunt Peg speaking. The BLUE text is Mom (Barb) speaking. Also, as usual, you can click on the embedded photos to enlarge them.

Dear Aunt Peg,

Here we are in Estes Park, Colorado.

OK, we have played this course every year since I was 10 years old. Every night that we stayed in Estes Park. Mr. Mitchell has become a family friend. You know, he bought this course in 1955. And it still only costs $3.00 to play. Before he bought this course, he owned one in Cody, Wyoming. He bought the one in Cody for $5,000, and he made $8,000 on it the first year he owned it. (1952). That Cody course is still in existence - it’s run by the city now.

I love Mr. Mitchell’s signs. That side room used to have arcade games in it (Ms. Pac-Man and one other, if I remember correctly), but now Mr. Mitchell has turned it into a sort of a miniature Estes Park museum.

I love the place where the people who win free games get to sign their names.

Mr. Mitchell always had the most interesting selection of golf balls to choose from. This is the only photo I’ve got of Mr. Mitchell, as he doesn’t like to be photographed. I played with a red ball, and a ball that was painted to look like the globe of planet Earth!

They let you pick your own club, which is excellent. This was a crowded day, so there were a lot of clubs in use. There were people on almost every hole.

Luckily the scenery is WONDERFUL!!!

This was a felt course. It was a little wrinkly. That happens with his course. But he does just replace the carpets from time to time.

Mom likes how he has well-placed boards with clips and pencils for your score card.

Every hole has either a bench or plastic chairs. Mr. Mitchell understands that the elderly may need to be able to sit between holes. Grandpa loves that.

LOOK at those flowers!!! You know, when Mrs. Mitchell was still alive there were a LOT of columbines and lobelias.

The alligator's mouth used to open and close, but it doesn't work anymore. It also doesn’t give an automatic hole-in-one if you putt through it anymore.

I know. It hasn’t for years. But when we were little, it always worked. Sigh.

LOOK!!! The windmill has made a propeller on Aaron’s head!!!

The infamous 4th hole that taught me to putt straight.

Mr. Mitchell’s kids own the gas station.

Look how many older people there are on this course!!

Well, there are so many people who have been coming here for years. Everyone comes there and talks to Mr. Mitchell for 5 or 10 minutes before they play. Plus, it’s cheap. It’s cash-only. But, where can you get that amount of entertainment for that price?? Plus, Mr. Mitchell gives away a lot of free games to people who have been coming there for years.

He changed this hole since we last saw it. He added a piece of wood on the left-side barrier so you couldn’t cheat by hitting your ball really hard, bouncing off the backstop and over the side.

Yeah, when we were kids we used to just whack our balls really hard to try to bounce over the left side!!

I love how he’s got hand-painted backgrounds on so many of the holes. I wonder if Mrs. Mitchell painted them?? In any case, they’ve been continually re-touched - they always look fresh.

This windmill is still a guaranteed hole-in-one, as he’s maintained this ditch that directs your ball. When I was younger, I thought the ditch had just been worn in by years of play, but mom recently told me that it's actually how the hole is designed.

Man, we looked forward to this hole when we were kids!!!

Dad missed the entrance to the windmill, however. Mom says, “It happens.” Dad blew a raspberry at us.

Another painting, and a fun picture of the aforementioned beautiful scenery.

I love the foxes. I love the moon.

Unfortunately, the back plank on this hole is completely dead. Mom says it used to bounce back a little bit. You used to be able to hit it off the back and roll in, but not anymore.

There was an elk just outside the fence. Sorry about the poor quality of the photos, that was due to my having to take the photo over he chain-link fence at the edge of the property. There was a sign on the fence, saying to be sure to keep the gate closed so the elk don’t come in and eat the flowers on the golf course.

Man, I love Estes Park!! I remember one year, the elk all just came to the park next to the library and just sat in the park!! Like, a whole herd of them!!! Apparently they hung out there for a couple of days!!

The whole front range is painted here. Long’s Peak is on the left, Hallett’s is near the middle, and the Mummy Range is on the right.

Here’s the free game hole.

Uncle Dave’s family won FIVE free games one night!! Look!! It’s Michael’s signature!! He’s our illustrator!!!

You know, when we started playing minigolf here, Dave was too young to play on the course near our home in Nebraska. But Mr. Mitchell will let children of any age play - with adult supervision. It was such a treat for Dave to get to play, instead of just watch. That’s one of the reasons this course is so beloved by us. And probably gazillions of others.

Statistics (from four nights of golf):

Par: 51
Aaron: 41/40/47/41
Barb: 39/39/44/42
Paul: 48/47/44/44

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 1 putt. Partly because he’s set the par so high, which really makes children feel encouraged. On the scorecards, he even prints "Keep your score and watch your game improve."

Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 10 balls according to Aaron.

You know, this is a rating that takes into account familiarity, and other intangibles like, owner friendliness, adjacent elk, and fabulous mountain aromas.

Coming next: Cascade Creek Mini-Golf

Brookside Miniature Golf

2010-08-18T12:19:00.001-05:00

Dear Aunt Peg:

We left DeKalb really early today, and got to Kearney, Nebraska at around 4:00. So, we had an early dinner and then went to The Big Apple Fun Center - a big entertainment complex.

It had bowling - like, 40 lanes worth - indoor miniature golf (Pirate themed. We didn’t play this course because we’d played Pirate golf in Dollywood), video games and food, outdoor volleyball, go-carts, billiards, darts, a kids’ ball-pit . . .

OK, what on EARTH is a kids’ ball pit?? Aaron just showed me a little clip from the web-site - OMG!!! It looks like a bizarre place where small children are PELTED with multi-colored plastic balls!!!!!! In the clip the children seem to enjoy this activity. I wonder, will it leave them psychologically scarred??

. . . plus outdoor miniature golf. Which is what we chose to play. The black-light golf and the outdoor golf were the same price. We thought these prices were a little high for such a small town in a remote area. These prices displayed right here are the before 6 p.m. prices. We considered doing “infinite bowling” which isn’t on this chart, but sounded like a great idea. But we just golfed.

Whoa. Infinite Bowling. I’m sure there’s something cosmic going on there . . .

This first hole was the most broken of all the holes. I hit my ball into the red receptacle, which was a rotating wheel, and look where it came out! Argh! This began to remind me of that horrifying Wii Golf that we played!!

Mom’s ball came out here! What was she supposed to do with that?!

Dad’s ball actually got stuck in the wheel! So, um, do you use a 5 iron for that, or what?

By this time “Guantanamera" was firmly lodged in my head!!!

Oh, wait, look at this score card. See the upper portion? That’s the layout of the whole course! We thought it was supposed to be a message, but then we realized it was just the layout and nothing more.

HA!!! It’s communication from an alien race!!! That same alien race that created that minigolf course with the decorations that weren’t QUITE normal - and the ALIEN PIG!!!!!! Why are aliens so attracted to minigolf, that’s what I want to know?????

After that first hole, the course really settled down. The turf was slow, the sides were cement, and the cups were a little shallow. But, basically everything worked.

LOOK at this cigarette butt (in the bottom of the second of the above two photos, boxed in red)!!! Oh, man, they are in the WEST!!!! When I asked about it, Barb said, “we went walking around Kearney, and there was a water fountain in the chemistry department at the University of Nebraska at Kearney campus, and there was a sign at the fountain that said, “don’t spit chaw in this fountain!” SHEESH!!!!

These were the next three holes.

DIG that shadow!!! That’s cool!!

See the artificial stream? That's probably why this course was called “Brookside Mini-Golf”.

Are these buckets ASH TRAYS?!?!? And look, the water is normal- colored!!

Look at this photo!!!! I THOUGHT it was Barb’s ball lying on the ground next to obstacles, and I couldn’t figure out how her ball could’ve gotten there, but in fact, Aaron caught her ball in mid-air flying from ramp to ramp!!! Isn’t that amazing!!! Perhaps he should consider a career as a sports photographer!!!

Mom got a hole-in-one on that hole.

Get OUT!!!!

On this hole you could go to the left, which was safe, or you could go over the bridge, which would send you anywhere BUT the hole because the steel has all kinds of texture on it! Look at Dad’s ball flying off the bridge!

Look!!! I love this hole!!!

I actually went up this ramp perfectly, and didn’t get a hole-in-one. But Mom DID get a hole-in-one. What’s up with that?

See this fountain? The water may not have been blue, but it smelled like a swimming pool. But, they made the end of the course - the last two holes - so that you could be sprayed by this fountain. I didn't appreciate this feature.

But you NEED that in Nebraska!! Man, the heat there is TERRIBLE!!

This hole is an uphill ramp, and this is where Dad got frustrated with the course and adopted a policy of just smacking the ball hard to see what would happen, which is a bad idea on this course, when you need to get into the holes on the bottom of the lighthouse. His ball flew up, banked off the lighthouse, and nearly hit the couple who was playing two holes behind us!

I hope he yelled, “FORE!!!!!!"

This is by far the longest hole I’ve ever played. It kind of reminded me of a go-kart track. Here’s Mom, encouraging her ball to go a little bit farther so she wouldn't be stuck under the bridge. It didn’t. Luckily she could still kind of reach it with her putter.

Hole 17 is where we had to actually take a trick shot. Dad got his ball stuck in the tunnel, and had to use a pool shot to get out!

The photo of the pool shot.

HA!!!!!

Hole 18 is the free game. None of us won one, though as it was really difficult. You had to hit the ball up the ramp, and then you’d get bonked around by all these pegs. I couldn't get a great picture because the sun was at a bad angle and the whole thing was enclosed by this chain-link fence housing.

Statistics:

Par: 42
Aaron: 45
Barb: 43
Paul: 54

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 3 putts.

Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 7.5 The holes are rather long, and some of the obstacles don’t work the way they should. And if you’re allergic to chlorine you’ll have trouble with the last couple of holes.

Coming next: Mr. Mitchell’s Tiny Town - Estes Park, Colorado

River View Miniature Golf

2010-08-16T10:52:00.000-05:00

First let me say that this course is NOT exactly where their web-site says it is!! That’s kind of aggravating!! It says on their web-site that the course is in Pottawatomie Park in St. Charles, Illinois, which it is. But then they say parking is “2 blocks north of Main Street on 2nd Avenue”. Which it clearly is NOT!! Man!! I got to that intersection, and started heading north on 2nd Avenue, and drove, 6 or 8 blocks, it seemed like!! Finally, there was an entrance to the park. I went in - I could see the swimming pool, the tennis courts, the riverboats, the regulation golf, but not the minigolf!! Finally I went to the swimming pool and asked at the desk where the minigolf was. They were very friendly. In case you go there: it’s SOUTH of the main parking lot right on the Fox River.

HA!!! I liked the idea that we could rent “food canoes” if we wanted to!! HA!! Would this be canoes made out of food?? Or ones that take you TO food???

This course has a special pretty much every day of the week, and the day we went was “grandparents’ day”. Bring one grandparent, and one person in your party gets in free. This was a park-district course, so it was pretty cheap to begin with: $5.00 per person for 18 holes. Anyway, we brought Dad (who is Aaron’s grandfather) and not only did he TREAT us to a round of golf, but he got in free!! Wahooo!!!

This course was ANCIENT astroturf. The turf was so ancient that the greens were really fast. And really lumpy!! They had these sort of rubberized tee areas. And, look, a lovely waterfall in a NATURAL color (in the top-right of the photo)!!

The greens were really fast, and then the boundaries of the holes were all these very low bricks. These things meant that we bounced completely OUT of the putting area and all across the course A LOT!! (This accounts for Aaron’s terrible score!). Seriously, I’ve never played a course where we spent so much time running everywhere retrieving our balls!!

Oh, look at this lovely water wheel!!

This hole had a little tunnel under a fake rock. Dad putted just perfectly - if the object was to lodge your ball exactly underneath the rock!!! He had to sort of pool-cue it back out!!! Aaron and Barb both got bounced back by the rock!!

Dad says to be sure to say that there weren’t enough benches for old people on this course!! They had one about every 6th hole.

There was a windmill hole - but the windmill was TINY!!! (Aaron says: "Note my perfect Fairway Solitaire pose!" Fairway Solitaire is a golf-themed solitaire game made by Grey Alien and Big Fish Games.)

Also, I would say MORE than 50% of these holes had a choice of cups to putt into!!! Isn’t that odd??

You know, the greens were so fast, and so lumpy, and the obstacles were so many, that often rather than strategizing our tee shots, we would just whack the ball and see what happened. In other words, it was too much - whatever we did, the outcome seemed to be random. Once you got your lucky or unlucky tee shot, then you could strategize. I didn’t like that your tee shot had just too many variables to even have fun strategizing.

LOOK!! Here was a ball that had bounced out - and no one had found it!!! We asked another party on the course - the man was putting a walnut - if this was their lost ball. But they said it wasn’t. Wonder why he was putting a walnut, then????

But, this course was right on the banks of the Fox River, and it was gorgeous. It could’ve been like that course we played in Sugar Grove where every hole was exactly the same and we would’ve loved it, on account of the river was beautiful and breezy!

Doesn’t this log look like a pig snout????

OK, Aaron’s ball bounced out, and we spent FOREVER searching for it in this tall grass!!! Something you expect from regulation golf, but NOT from minigolf!!!

Hole 18 was a lighthouse - and an automatic ball-return.

And, look!! A play-again special: half-price on the second 18!! That’s $2.50, which is an amazing bargain!!

Statistics:

Par: 42
Aaron: 64
Barb: 50
Dad/Grandpa: 54
Peg: 56

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 5 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 6.5 balls. Aaron was aggravated by this course because it was fast and lumpy. Barb loved it because it was beautiful. Peg didn’t appreciate the randomness of the tee shots, but loved the river. Dad wanted more benches.

Coming soon: Big Apple Minigolf, Kearney, Nebraska

Dimples

2010-08-09T03:21:00.004-05:00

Dimples.

If we let our golf-hero tee up a perfectly spherical golf ball - no dimples - and hit it with a driver, and then magically replaced that same ball with a dimpled ball and replayed exactly the same drive: the dimpled ball would go approximately 200 yards further than the plain spherical ball!! Isn’t that amazing?? Those tiny, tiny dimples, which seem just RANDOM - they don’t seem to be worth anything - change the drive from a 100 yard drive to a 300 yard drive!!

Or, remember that short story by Ray Bradbury, “A Sound of Thunder”? (first published in Collier’s magazine in 1952, it is the most re-printed sci-fi story of all time). It was the story about the guy who went back in time recreationally, but accidentally crushed a butterfly while he was in the distant past. When he returns to the future, it is completely altered on account of the tiny, seemingly insignificant fact that a butterfly’s life was taken.

You know, it’s easy to become discouraged in our present circumstances. No one has any money, jobs are scarce. America, it turns out, isn’t so heroic after all. We’re destroying the planet, but we’re afraid to think about that because we don’t know how to stop. And there are so many, many people whose lives are so miserable that it’s easy to think that we could work 24/7 and donate ALL that money to good causes, and it would be less than a drop in the ocean, because the need is so vast.

I think we should change our perspective. Instead of seeing the vastness of the trouble and being overwhelmed, let’s just see individual, tiny ways we can make a difference.

I was listening to Speaking of Faith on NPR this weekend. They had Rachel Naomi Remen on. She’s a physician who’s one of the first physicians to really concentrate on the mind-body connection. Her grandfather was what she describes as “a flaming mystic”. This weekend she talked about how, for her fourth birthday, her gift from her grandfather was to be told the story of how the world was created.

He told her that, in the heart of the sacred darkness, suddenly there was a light. And that light was in a sacred vessel. But, she said, because it was a Jewish story, there was an accident!! The vessel was dropped, and the light shattered into a thousand thousand pieces. And we’re here to gather the light back - it’s lodged deeply inside each of us.

Part of the point of this story is that we are exactly what is needed to heal the world. Each one of us. And Rachel Naomi Remen asked herself, “how would I live, if I believe I was exactly what was needed to heal the world?”

Now, THERE’s an interesting perspective!! Instead of being overwhelmed by how much there is to do, believe that the small thing that you CAN do is EXACTLY what is needed!!

I think those small things are WAY smaller than we realize. I think we are still caught up in, “oh, but I can’t really donate EVERY Thursday evening to working at the soup kitchen!! I’m WAY too over-scheduled as it is!”

RIGHT!!! We ARE way too over-scheduled!! But, what if we didn’t change anything on our schedules - but we changed the WAY we did everything on our schedules??

No, no, no!!! NOT a big change - only this: what if we just connected with everyone we encountered. What if, instead of looking inside our heads at our spinning thoughts, we just made eye-contact with the other humans we encountered, and just smiled.

What if, just by being pleasant and acknowledging the humanity of the others on this planet, we made everyone else’s day just one iota better - by just sharing a smile? Nothing larger than that. Nothing larger than a butterfly. Or a dimple on a golf ball.

I think that could make an enormous, profound difference.

Coming next: River View Miniature Golf, St. Charles, Illinois

Wii KidzSports Crazy Golf

2010-08-06T08:28:00.001-05:00

(by Bold Games, developed by Data Design Interactive)

Today we decided to stay indoors and try out a Wii minigolf game. My sister (Aaron’s mom) picked up Wii KidzSports Crazy Golf for something like $15.00. So the three of us settled down to play the first 18 holes available on that game.

It’s a game that has four 18 holes courses: Waicoco Islands (which is unlocked at the start of the game) Teekee Moon, Jungle Temple, and Volcano Island.

Barb and Aaron had already created their avatars when they tried this game out with Paul earlier in the week. So, I had to create my avatar. First, let me say, the game wouldn’t let me have blue hair!!! What’s up with that?!?! I ALWAYS have a blue-haired avatar!! PLUS, it wouldn’t let me name myself Flester Dreadfulwater, which is my regular avatar name. OK, casual games often won’t let me use such a long name, but THIS game wouldn’t even let me use Flester!!! I had to be FlestR!!! Sheesh!!

Hole number one played Guantanamera as its background music. I love that song.   It means “girl from Guantanamo”.   I just learned that. I had thought the lyrics were written by Pablo Neruda, but I am an idiot, the song was written by Jose Fernandez Diaz, who is, of course Cuban. Pablo Neruda is Chileno, and that’s not even his real name, but a pen name he chose to honor a Czech poet, Jan Neruda!!! What a lot I’ve learned ALREADY!!!

ANYWAY, our avatars all wiggled their butts in a very cute fashion, and then hit the ball in a totally random manner. You know, this game tries to get you to use the Wii-mote just like you’d use a golf club, but the sensors on the Wii-mote aren’t really accurate enough to do that. So, we’d either putt our balls about a foot, or we’d over-shoot the hole entirely and end up in the ocean. By the time we finished with hole number one I was so mad at the stupid game I didn’t want to play anymore!!!

Hole number 2 played Mary Ann as our background music. I like that song OK. Not as much as Guantanamera, though. In this hole you have to putt over a curvy bridge. Once you accomplish that, you’re spat out onto a green that is pretty much a funnel. So you’d THINK this would be a relatively easy hole. But, mostly I ended up in the ocean. And let me just say right now: ALL golf courses should have a 6 stroke maximum. If you can’t get it in the hole in 6 strokes, just pick up your ball. This hateful game had a NINE stroke maximum, which was just TORTURE!!!

OH!! Also, this is a game for kids, right?? If you got over par - your avatar HIT HIMSELF IN THE HEAD WITH HIS GOLF CLUB!!!!! What kind of thing is that to do in a kids game?????   OMIGOD!!!!

Hole number 3 was accompanied by a mystery soprano sax song. This was a hole where you just had to putt straight up a hill. I never made it up the hill. Aaron, however, parred this hole, so I had him FINISH the hole for me.

And let me also say at this point, don’t drink liquids while playing this game. The sound effects of the first course are all surfy - but their surf sounds like running water, which just made me need to pee. Sheesh!!!

Hole 4 was back to Guantanamera. Hmm. You know, I like that song, but I don’t really want to hear ANY song over and over and over. This hole was a straight shot under a bunch of croquet hoops.   Knowing that golf began with a wooden ball and a wooden club, I just checked to see if golf and croquet were related, but apparently not at all!!

On hole number 4 we discovered that if you birdie a hole, your avatar does a little birdie dance that resembles a flamingo imitation. Needless to say, it was not MY avatar who did the birdie dance!!!

Hole 5 played Mary Ann again. In fact, those three songs (it turned out) were the only songs this game knows, and it shamelessly cycles through them. ‘Til you’re ready to shoot the television. I recommend turning off the sound and turning on your iPod. Sheesh.

It was on hole number 5 that I realized that there IS no good luck in this game, only bad luck. It was also on hole number 5 that I realized I could easily con EITHER my sister OR Aaron to play the entire hole for me. Whew!!! I HATE this game!!!

Hole 6 - I got a hole-in-one!! OK, I take it back, what I said about no good luck!!! The hole-in-one dance is no fancier than the birdie dance. Man, that’s a mistake. I looked at the credits of this game: there were NO women involved in the design of this game. Well, THAT’s a problem right there!!!

Hole 7 - at this point, both Barb and Aaron told me I needed to mention that there is an inordinately LONG load time in between holes. This was the hole in which my putter suddenly acted like a driver and lofted my ball up into the air, where it smacked into some sort of bridge, bounced backwards, and completely off the edge of the video game world. Sheesh.

Hole 8 - this hole was TOO aggravating to play. This game is mind-numbingly stupid.

Hole 9 - THANK GOD this is almost over!!! This hole had a loop-de-loop, which was nice. But, even though we’d intended to play 18 holes, we couldn’t bear to play any more. I don’t know HOW you unlock the other 3 sets of 18 holes. We HAD to quit.

Statistics:

Par: 31
Aaron: 37
Barb: 41
Peg: 46

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 7 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): Aaron said to give it 2 balls, but I want to give it a NEGATIVE number. Seriously!! This game SUCKED!!!!

Coming soon: Thoughts on Dimples

Congo River Adventure Golf: Falls Course

2010-08-04T00:38:00.001-05:00

The second 18 holes at Congo River Adventure was the Falls Course.

They had the same “scavenger hunt” thing going on - once again we loved it, and THIS time we found all the objects!!! (Actually, we never found the spear, but the girl at the front desk gave us both the prize anyway!! If you find all the hunt items, you get a yellow bouncy ball with a smiley face on it!!)

The over-under hole.

You know, this course was pretty full when we played it. We started a little after 10:00 a.m., and finished at 11:50!! Normally we play faster than that, but we were looking for the scavenger hunt items, plus there were people in front of us.

I love water falls. Even if they ARE blue!! A blue not found in nature!!

And I love the bridges. And I love stepping over water!!

These holes - they actually are a lot like regulation golf. Complete with really rolling terrain.

Oh, look at the ridges in this one!!

Ha!! No Con Go!!! It makes me think of the Star Trek episode “No Kill I”. Remember that one?? My brother Dave just mentioned it last week.

You know, the amazing thing about this course - actually, both halves of this course - was that our balls NEVER bounced out of bounds. Seriously, there were some pretty steep down-hills, and I often worried that our balls would be going so fast by the time they got to the bottom that they’d just bounce off the rocks and keep going. But they never did. Marvelous engineering, I’m thinking. The same kind of engineering that made these holes all so friendly.

And look at these lovely picnic tables at the end - still in the Congo River theme.

I ought to mention that we both really enjoyed the music on this course. It was REALLY diverse: we heard Stevie Wonder, an Israeli folk song, some 50s doowop, some contemporary world music. I don’t know if there was a central player that shuffled through that vast an array of music, or whether different holes had different genres. But we really liked it!!

There was a game arcade at the end - with a Family Guy pinball machine.

Statistics:

Par: 40
Aaron: 46
Peg: 49

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 3.5 putts (but higher for children on account of the really long fairways and steep up-hill holes).

Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 7.5 balls according to Aaron. 8 balls according to Peg. Aaron liked how there were a lot of down-hills. Peg liked the friendly, friendly cups!!

Coming next: Wii Golf!!!

Golf Holes

2010-08-02T00:18:00.001-05:00

The actual golf hole.

Don’t you wonder how THAT came about?? I mean, there are gazillions of games that hit balls with mallets. Hockey. Croquet. Polo, for Pete’s Sake! But, I think there’s no other game that hits balls into holes in the ground!!

Most people (or most people who think about this stuff) believe that our modern golf game originated with Scottish shepherds, who were knocking stones into rabbit holes on the site of what is now the Old Course at St. Andrews.

Man, I hope those guys were mindful of the rabbits - not to bonk them on the head when they were trying to come out of their homes!! And another thing: I live in Evanston, where we are OVER-RUN with rabbits. Why have I never seen a rabbit hole??

And what about the term, “rabbit hole”?? (Meaning a difficult situation). This expression comes to us from Alice in Wonderland, on account of Alice GOT to Wonderland by falling down a rabbit hole. Man, are the rabbit holes more robust in the United Kingdom, or what??

The first reference to a hole - an actual hole that was part of a created golf course - is from the Royal Aberdeen Golf Club. In 1625 some Aberdeen local talks about some military exercises “betwixt the first hole and the Queen’s (sic) hole.”

The holes were standardized by the St. Andrews course. And the size (4.25 inches in diameter) was decided on because some people at Musselburgh had just invented, in 1829, the hole-cutter!!! And that was the size that first hole-cutter made the holes!! That actual first hole cutter, by the way, is actually on display in the clubhouse at Royal Musselburgh. Wow!!

You know, I was teaching a class last Saturday, and I went to the bathroom there. On the inside of the stall door, there was a sign that said, “Absolutely NOTHING other than toilet paper in these toilets!” MAN!! I thought, so, I CAN’T pee after all?? I mean, seriously!! If I had had post-it notes in my purse, I would’ve asked that question on the post-it note and stuck it to the sign!!

It really bugs me when people write signs that are unclear or misleading. Unless it’s amusing. Like, the bathrooms at the Metra Station in the Ogilvie Transportation Center in Chicago. Man, those signs are hilarious!! On the inside of the stall doors there are signs saying, “Beware of stolen purses!” WOW!!! ‘Cause, what do the stolen purses do?? Come and mug us???

But, those are no match for the sign that Aaron saw this week. He was in Colorado, playing a couple minigolf courses near Rocky Mountain National Park. They were driving on a mountain road, where there was mountain on the right hand side of the road, and a sheer drop into the abyss on the left side of the road. And during that scary stretch, there was a sign that said, “no left turn”. I think he laughed and laughed at that!!

OK, enough about signs. Back to golf holes. The only other thing I want to cover today is: why are there 18 holes?? And once again, the answer is St. Andrews.

From 1872, the British Open golf championship was held annually in rotation at Prestwick, St Andrews and Musselburgh. The contest was always over 36 holes and it was, therefore, three rounds when it was held at Prestwick (which at that time had 12 holes), two rounds when at St Andrews (18 holes) and four rounds at Musselburgh (9 holes).

Then, in 1882, Prestwick expanded its course to 18 holes. Then in 1891, when the Honourable Company built Muirfield, they created 18 holes there. Since they sponsored the Open, the championship moved with them from Musselburgh to Muirfield. With the three foremost clubs in the world using 18 holes, the norm for a golf round was set.

St. Andrews was given control of the Rules of Golf in the UK in 1897. But the Rules of Golf didn’t stipulate an 18-hole round until 1950.

Coming next: More Congo River Adventure Golf!!

Congo River Adventure Golf: Rapids Course

2010-07-28T01:39:00.001-05:00

Congo River Adventure Golf
1325 N. Barrington Road, Hoffman Estates, Illinois

First: YAY!!! Aaron is back from Dollywood!! Wahooo!!!!

Dang!! Look at this sign!! Do you think they have a lot of broken putters??? Sheesh!!!

Hey, look at these low scores!! We did WAY better than that!! We should’ve told them our scores!!! RATS!!!!

Practice green. Gotta love that.

OK, so, at Congo River Adventure, there are two 18 hole courses - which you can play in combination for $11.95. Not bad.

We played Congo River Rapids first.

One of my favorite things about this course was the “scavenger hunt”. They had a bunch of decorations you were supposed to look for throughout the course. If you saw one, you were supposed to write down what hole you were playing when you saw it. If you saw all six of the hunt items, they’d give you a prize: a smiley-face superball!

Man, this was BRILLIANT!! It meant that if you were waiting behind a slow party, you could spend your time looking for the hunt items. It meant that kids who were waiting for others in their party to putt could also be looking for the hunt items. It was just a BRILLIANT idea!!! (Pictured below is the "mask" item. It's mounted on the shack.)

Look how lovely this course is!! Although, once again with the blue water!!

There were lots of bridges you got to walk on - I loved that.

You know, in general this course had long, interesting “fairways” that you really wanted to think about your strategy, and then they had exceptionally friendly cups. Seriously, the cups were often just slightly depressed, compared to the surrounding green, so that if you were sort of headed in the direction of the hole, you’d tend to roll in. This made you feel like a really super-competent golfer (and would be GREAT for kids).

There were a lot of holes where you putted into a hole on the top tier and then were spat out below - none of these gave automatic holes-in-one, though.

Look at this guy drooling blue water!!!

We got to this hole, and thought it was a hole with a couple of REALLY harsh gaps, and then we realized that the hole was set up so that once you were in the water you’d be automatically routed onto the green below. I have to say, I love a hole where you get to putt into the water!!

See this cork-screw hole?? There were a lot of holes like this, where, really, you just teed off in the general direction that seemed logical, and then you got spat out on a very friendly green.

Wait a minute!! What happened to this guy?? Is he a guy who’s dead and sunk into the sand?? Or is he just a sleeping stick figure?? And why does he make me want to sing “Particle Man”??

Statistics:

Par: 41
Aaron: 53
Peg: 46

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 3.5 putts (but higher for children on account of the really long fairways and steep up-hill holes).

Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 7.5 balls according to Aaron. 8 balls according to Peg. Aaron liked how there were a lot of downhill putts. Peg liked the friendly, friendly cups!!

Coming next: Congo River Falls

Felt

2010-07-26T00:34:00.001-05:00

Felt.

By some time in the 1930s, all the minigolf courses that weren’t part of the Tom Thumb franchise, or the Bob-O-Link franchise were in search of a putting surface. That’s because those two franchises were the only ones that could afford to use the patented cottonseed-hull surface developed in the late 1920s. (The royalties were steep.)

People tried all kinds of crazy things, including compressed feathers, ground sponge mixed with cement, and oiled sawdust. Carpet would’ve worked, but it was way too expensive, and hard to maintain.

In the end, goat-hair felt was the surface that won. It’s the surface that I putted on for most of my childhood.

Felt is arguably the oldest man-made fabric on this planet. They’ve found felt remnants in the tombs of Siberian Tlai mountain horsemen dating back to 700 b.c. Felt is easy to make: just take fibers - any kind of fibers - get them wet and smoosh them together.

St. Clement, who became the 4th Bishop of Rome, is credited with inventing felt. (So, he invented it for HIS part of the world, is what I’m thinking. I mean, if they’ve found felt dating from 700 b.c. there’s no way St. Clement could’ve invented it, actually!!)

Anyway, St. Clement stuffed his shoes with flax fibers to make his shoes more comfortable, walked around with sweaty feet for a couple of weeks, and then realized he had a piece of finely crafted felt in his shoes which he could remove and use for something (if he could stand the smell - ew!!!) After he became Bishop he set up a bunch of felting operations (hopefully no longer using the SHOE method for the moisture and compression).

It was his relationship with felt that made St. Clement the patron saint of hatmakers, who use felt extensively to this day.

Mercury was used for awhile in the making of felt for hats. But mercury poisoning causes tremors and hallucinations. The term “mad hatter” really came from the debilitating effects the mercury had on the hatters until mercury was finally removed from the process late in the nineteenth century.

So, goat felt.

You know, there’s a restaurant in Door County, Wisconsin that has goats living on the roof. Al Johnson’s in Sister Bay. Here’s a YouTube video of the goats on top of the restaurant:

One summer while I was working in Door County, a bunch of tourists were having breakfast at Al Johnson’s when one of the goats (who was at the time tethered up on the roof) fell OFF the roof!! The FURIOUS goat dangled right at the level of the restaurant windows, bouncing off one of the windows and freaking everyone out ‘til someone went out and hauled him back up to the top of the roof. He was fine. But he was really MAD!!!!

I think a goat on the roof is a really great, green idea!!! Wonder if my condo association would go for it??

Anyway, back to the goat hair felt putting surfaces!!

Eventually outdoor carpets were invented and replaced goat-hair felt, and now it seems like all the courses with money are going to astro-turf. I’m still hoping to find a real grass course someplace!!!

Coming next: Congo River Adventure (FINALLY - back in Illinois!!)

Blacklight Pirate Golf (in MagiQuest)

2010-07-23T07:36:00.004-05:00

Note: For this entry, the BLACK text is Aaron speaking. The PINK text is Aunt Peg speaking. Also, as usual, you can click on the embedded photos to enlarge them.

Dear Aunt Peg:

Today my parents surprised me by going someplace I had wanted to go based on a brochure we picked up. It’s called MagiQuest, located in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, and it looked to be something like a real-life video game!

MagiQuest is situated inside this giant castle. There were four attractions in this castle: a mirror maze, the vault (which is like a spy movie where you have to avoid the infra-red security lasers), and Pirate Golf were downstairs; and MagiQuest itself was upstairs. You could pay for just the downstairs or just the upstairs, or $18 per person for both.

This guy was running the front of house. He was dressed kind of like Altair from Assassin’s Creed. He was happy to pose for photos. He also explained how everything worked, including showing us his wand as a demonstration.

Pirate Golf was all felt (not astro-turf). And many of the holes were quite small, as space was limited. Look, your shoes and socks glow in this glow-in-the-dark room!

They did a great job with scenery. Unfortunately, Mom picked a blue ball, and much of the felt was blue, so she had a hard time finding her ball in the dark most of the time.

This is one of their longer holes.

On this hole, there was a motion sensor that played thunder sounds and flashed when your ball went under. Dad kept sticking his club under it and setting it off.

This was just a painted wall. It looked really nice.

They had occasional video screens, where film loops were showing of pirates trying to escape, among other things.

This hole had ridges.

This guy popped out of the barrel when you putted underneath him.

Man, I’m beginning to get the feeling that you had to be there!! These photos are so dark - I can’t see ANYTHING!!

Mom’s ball got stuck under the skull’s gold tooth!!

Here’s the pirate ship.

Oh, OK, I guess I can see these.

See, there’s Mom’s blue ball against the blue felt.

This hole was really well done - there was a video of a ship caught in a whirlpool screening on the wall, and the golf hole was like a funnel, so when your ball went down the funnel, it was as if it was in the whirlpool that the ship was in!

OK, that’s way cool.

We all got a hole-in-one on the cannon hole. It wasn’t an automatic hole-in-one type hole, we just all happened to putt straight.

This is Madam Olga. She’d ask for your palm, and then she’d say, “I foresee you’ll get a hole-in-one!!”

Here’s the over-under hole.

A video of a guard sleeping.

Yeah, there’s a lot of action there!!

And then he’d wake up and talk at you for awhile.

Oh.

On this hole, when you putted under the treasure chest it opened and you could see the gold.

That’s cool!! I wish it also had rubies, emeralds, sapphires . . .

This is what you saw on the way out.

On hole 18 you either hit it in the center, for a score of 1, or if you missed, you got a 2. It was a ball-return. If you got it in the center, the arrow lit up, and the pirate, his parrot, and his skull would all sing a song for you.

Like, did they take requests??? What song did they sing????

Statistics:

Par: 38
Aaron: 43
Barb: 39
Paul: 36

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 2 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 7 balls. I certainly enjoyed this course. It was my first black-light course, and that was fun. And they really kept the pirate theme.

We went on to do the mirror maze. Which really only had one way you could go, so it was really more like a mirror hallway. They made you wear these plastic gloves so that when you felt the mirrors to find the way out, you wouldn’t get nasty fingerprints all over everything.

This is inside the maze. The second picture is inside the infinity room.

OK, I couldn’t love this more. Although, it reminds me of a woman’s bathroom I once visited. Seriously, a theatre patron (who has to remain anonymous - but she’s got at least one Tony in her library) has a bathroom with mirrored walls (and possibly ceilings and floors - I can’t remember now) so you can watch yourself pee into infinity - WHEEE!! The bathroom also spritzes you with perfume upon your exit. Which, come on, I like to choose my own fragrance!!

This is one of those walls where you move in front of it and it reacts. They’ve got walls like those at Children’s Museums sometimes.

And then we went on to do the vault, which took about a minute for each of us.

We went to lunch at the Mellow Mushroom.

Now, that’s the kind of psychedelic place that looks inviting to an old hippie like me!!

They had a lava-lamp fire place.

Rock ON!! Did you know that lava lamps were originally invented as egg timers?? That is, they were modeled after British egg timers which were glass shakers that you put in the water along with the eggs you were boiling. When the wax in the shakers floated to the top, your eggs were done. The lava lamp just removed the eggs. Oh, and added the lamp. You know, I used to often keep a lava lamp in the pit of shows I was conducting. Very festive.

Then we began our MagiQuest, having obtained our wands. First, your data was downloaded onto your wand. We were also given the ancient book of wisdom, which detailed the various quests we would be doing.

We were brought into the training room, which gave us the back-story and let us test out our wands.

We went through the assorted realms - there were four of them. They had the forest, the village, the dragon’s lair, and the main quest-stone area. If you pointed your wand at a quest object, the object would react. Some things lit up and talked to you, some things opened, etc.

This is the Altar of Heroes. In our allotted 90 minutes I got all eleven runes, so I got to go to this place and the Quest Master congratulated me.

Meanwhile, here’s Mom doing the Fairy Quest. She saved the Fairy Crystals! Yay!

I made the leader board!! (My screen name is always Beta).

My screen name is always Flester Dreadfulwater.

Dad with his wand.

For anyone who’s interested, there are MagiQuests in a lot of locations. The closest one to Chicago is in Yorktown!!

Once you’ve played, they keep all your data on-line. You can go to other locations and collect other runes and such. You get to keep your wand after you’ve played, so you can come back and keep spending more money. You can upgrade your wand, and buy a special holster for it, and such.

The biggest MagiQuest of all is in Tokyo. (Even though this all started in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina). Pictures of the Tokyo MagiQuest, from the Magiquest web site, can be found at the link below.

http://www.magiquest.com/locations/kingdoms/japan-locations/tokyo-dome/photogallery/

SHEESH!! Sheesh to this whole MagiQuest business!!

In Japan, they advertise that MagiQuest is good for building unity and team-work skills. Whoa. They say, “bring your office party to MagiQuest”. The picture from he web site linked above showed some very serious Japanese businessmen fighting the dragon.

Coming next: Goat Felt Putting Surfaces - a history!!

Ripley’s Old MacDonald’s Farm Golf Part 3: "Chicken Egg-Spress"

2010-07-21T04:29:00.001-05:00

Note: For this entry, the BLACK text is Aaron speaking. The PINK text is Aunt Peg speaking. Also, as usual, you can click on the embedded photos to enlarge them.

Dear Aunt Peg:

This was our second day of playing at this course. Since we still had one game left to play and there was still one course we hadn't tried, we came back to play more at this fantastic course. With our final game, we decided to try the medium-level course, Chicken Egg-Spress.

At this hen-house they lay eggs cooked to order.

More of Old MacDonald.

Who is a really good human to his canine companion.

These cows also commented on your shots, like the horses did on that other course. They were also equally as frightening.

This pig was staring at me, so I had to get a picture, if only because it was kind of creepy.

Right - those aren’t porcine eyes!! Those are HUMAN eyes in a piggy face!!! Of course it’s creepy!!! I don’t think he’s really a pig at all!!! He’s an ALIEN!!!!!!!!!

This was funny. If you shot under the “security” dog house, the guard dog came out and said stuff at you!

Hole 11 looked out on the milking barn.

Look at the cat!! You know, I used to have a friend whose family owned a Grade C dairy. I think that means they mostly sold to cheese manufacturers. In any case, once they took the milking machines off the cows, the cats all came in and licked them clean!! I thought it was delightful. Perhaps the USDA wasn’t quite so enthusiastic.

Here’s another one of those pinball holes, only with what I think are gophers.

Right?? What ARE those beings??? Do they actually occur in nature?? Or is this course ACTUALLY an alien course, where aliens have designed what they THINK are our domesticated animals, only they’re all just a little bit OFF!!!!

More Heckle and Jeckle.

This was the first 2-tiered hole I can remember on this course. You putted into one of the two holes on the top, it went down the mud-making machine, and onto the bottom tier.

That pig looked very content.

That pig looks like an alien invader. You call that a pig???

Dad won another free game! For our free game, we played “Porky Putts” a second time.

See the pig-washer??

Right. You think that’s a pig-washer. That’s really a portal to their home planet!!

Statistics:

Par: 40
Aaron: 41
Barb: 38
Paul: 36

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 2 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 8.5 balls. I really loved this course. It was awesome.

Free game Statistics: (“Porky Putts”)

Par: 43
Aaron: 41
Barb: 39
Paul: 40

WHOA!! Dig all those scores!! My relatives are hot golfers!!

Coming soon: Black Light Pirate Golf at MagiQuest, Pigeon Forge, TN

Mini Golf Literature's Common Ancestor

2010-07-19T00:10:00.009-05:00

Yesterday was my day to go to the library. Most of the web-sites I’ve been consulting on the history of minigolf have one book as their source: “Miniature Golf” by John Margolies. As far as I can tell, this is the one and ONLY book ever written on the subject of miniature golf!!

I was amazed to find it in the card catalog at the Evanston Public Library, and even MORE amazed to find it on the shelf!! So, imagine my surprise when I pulled the book off the shelf, only to realize that its cover was made of ASTRO-TURF!!! I kid

you not!!! It’s hilarious!! Seriously, the library just put their weird plastic wrapper right over the astro-turf, just like any other book. Only, because it’s covered in turf, and now the turf is kinda smashed, it seems like matted fur, making the book feel a lot like that Book of Monsters that Harry Potter had to buy!! You remember, the one that came with a belt around it so it wouldn’t bite you!!

This book is great - it talks about what fierce competition there was between minigolf courses in the 30s. They had jungle-themed courses with live animals: a bear was tethered on one course, a monkey at another. They were both trained to snatch balls that people had putted!!

The Caliente course in Los Angeles had a pool and sunken gardens. And it had a castle built on top of a natural geyser that spewed steam 100 feet into the air. Denver, Colorado, had an indoor course that was the first venue of any kind to use neon light tubes submerged in pools!! Man, what an amazing effect!! I would like to see that!! I would like to SWIM in a pool like that!!!

John Margolies theorizes that a lot of “theme courses” allowed people to escape from the grim economic realities of the Depression - and immerse themselves in minigolf reality!! There was a course in Hewes Park (an L.A. suburb), “that had dragons and Chinese junks floating in the water hazards, and an ‘eight piece orchestra of genuine Chinese musicians playing Chinese classical and jazz’.”

Courses that contained miniatures of famous world architecture allowed people to feel as if they’d traveled, during a time when travel was too costly for the majority of people. I guess that explains the number of Eiffel Towers on courses around the country.

Courses also appeared in some crazy locales. There was a course installed in a graveyard in California - using the tombstones as a hazard!! Which reminds me,

there is a course in the Chicago suburbs that’s in the basement of a funeral home!! If you’re having your funeral there, you get (well, I guess your relatives get) a free round. I wonder if you can have your coffin be a hazard?? OK, a little over-the-top?? Sorry. Aaron and I keep saving that course for a day when it’s raining. So, hopefully we’ll get there before much longer!!

There were minigolf courses built in prisons (the New Hampshire State Prison was one) and at the Lincoln, Nebraska State Hospital for the Insane. (What a title!!)

The Ile de France was the first ship to install a course on board. I haven’t been on a cruise ship as a passenger - I wonder if minigolf is standard on them now??

In any case, courses sprung up everywhere, and particularly in vacant lots, where many felt minigolf was saving the neighborhood from Depression-era blight (while others felt the minigolf was dragging the neighborhood further down - on account of people playing all night and swearing over their missed shots all night!!)

Although most felt that minigolf was the hope of the Depression, and it did provide 100,000 new jobs at a time when the country clearly needed them, one industry was hurt by the minigolf boom: the movie industry. The studios actually discouraged their stars from being seen playing minigolf - they were so threatened by it. Box office receipts plummetted 25% during the heyday of minigolf. And yet, at the height of that fight, Mary Pickford built her own, surreal, Max Ernst-inspired course. Jackie Cougan also built his own private course. And Fred Astaire, as well as many other stars, were photographed playing minigolf.

Eventually, the studios gave in and began converting failing movie theatres into minigolf courses!!

You know, I keep thinking that minigolf is on the rise again on account of it’s cheap, and the economy is so awful right now. I can’t help but think a rise in minigolf is healthy - simply because of the human interaction required to play. Seriously, it’s cheaper than the movies, and you get vitamin D. What could be better??

Coming next: yet MORE Dollywood (how long were they THERE???)

Ripley’s Old MacDonald’s Farm Golf Part 2: " Porky Putts"

2010-07-16T01:20:00.015-05:00

Note: For this entry, the BLACK text is Aaron speaking. The PINK text is Aunt Peg speaking. Also, as usual, you can click on the embedded photos to enlarge them.

Dear Aunt Peg:

After we played through The Udder Course, we decided to play one more course that day. We chose the hard course, Porky Putts. We also played it one more time before we left.

The first thing on this course are these sunbathing, snorkeling, showering pigs. They were listening to “Surfing U.S.A.” and “Good Vibrations” and talking amongst themselves about the state of their affairs.

The sunbathers had a cooler - a “Pigloo” brand cooler, with “Pig Gulp” sodas.

Ha!!

This course didn’t seem to us to be any more difficult than the “Udder Course”. We only noticed the different theme.

OH!!! I love the duck in the innertube!! Now, see, this isn’t blue water - it’s NORMAL water!!! See, they don’t HAVE to dye their water!!!

OH!! Bees!! You know, I used to keep bees. Actually, one of my many ex-husbands was really the bee-keeper. We actually got an entire box of bees sent to us in the mail!! The postal carrier was not amused. It came in a wooden box - about 8 inches by 8 inches by 8 inches, all screened in on two sides. And filled, filled, filled, with hot, buzzing bees!

They were cute bees.

Pigs in . . . the mud?? Yes, it was concrete mud.

This goat yelled jokes at you.

Man, this makes me think of those places in Door County, Wisconsin, where they have actual, live goats on the roof!! Like, Al Johnson’s restaurant in Sister Bay. More on THAT later!

The best shot on this hole was to putt directly under the out-house. It gave a straight shot at the hole. They also played sounds effects of Old MacDonald PEEING inside the outhouse!! I actually got a hole-in-one the first time I played this hole.

Now THAT’S entertainment!!

On some of the holes, it was hard to see where everything would end up.

This was the only par 4 hole in the entire course. I actually got it in 2. It could go all the way around, or could cut through the wooden trough.

Dad’s ball got stuck in the wall.

Isn’t there a Pink Floyd song about that??

When you’d putt underneath these crates, the turkeys would pop up and say something.

Are these dinners made out of turkeys . . . or made FOR turkeys??

This hole was tough. There was an extremely small margin of error.

This was like a pin-ball hole. You’d hit your ball, and it’d roll down hill through all the rabbits.

This one was fun, because you could put into the trough, and the river was running through the trough, so the water would carry your ball down to the hole.

Another free game hole. Dad won, so he got to sign his name.

They had a Ripley’s “Super Fun Zone” next door. When you bought a round of minigolf, they’d give you two free tokens to that.

With our total of six tokens, we all played a round of pinball.

Statistics:

Par: 43
Aaron: 42
Barb: 44
Paul: 42

LOOK!!! Aaron broke par!!! So did Paul!!!

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 2.5 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 8.5 balls. I really loved this course. It was awesome.

Coming soon: Ripley’s Old MacDonald’s Farm Golf - “Chicken Eggs-press”

Ripley’s Old MacDonald’s Farm Golf Part 1: "The Udder Course"

2010-07-14T04:04:00.011-05:00

Note: For this entry, the BLACK text is Aaron speaking. The PINK text is Aunt Peg speaking. Also, as usual, you can click on the embedded photos to enlarge them.

Dear Aunt Peg:

Today we went to Ripley's "Old MacDonald's Farm Golf," in Sevierville, Tennessee. This was the surprise favorite of our trip. Here you can see Old MacDonald and his dog Duke positioned out in front, welcoming the guests.

We played this course over the next two days. They have three courses, and you could play all three for $15.00. The “Udder Course” (which was the cow theme) was considered the easy course; the “Chicken Egg-spress” (which was the chicken theme) was considered the medium course; and the “Porky Putts” (which was the pig theme) was considered the difficult course.

You know, I am laughing so hard I’m practically falling off my chair. This is ideal goofiness for minigolf, if you ask me!!

The first day we played the “Udder Course” and “Porky Putts”. It had just rained, so the astro-turf was wet.

To get in they gave you these neat tickets, and you scanned them and went through the turn-stile. Dad liked the face on the ticket.

Geez, almost like riding the el!!

They had a nice selection of putters. They were my favorite type of clubs - the perfect weight. The astro-turf was perfect, too. The ball selection was mostly pastel.

Yeah, Aaron always likes to play with a RED ball. Looks like he had to play with a pink!!

The “Udder Course.”

This course NEVER breaks its theme. That’s what I loved about this course. The first thing you notice, at the first hole, even, is that all of these cows are mooing at you really loudly. It’s ridiculous. And back there, in Old MacDonald’s shed, you can hear them hammering away at a project, occasionally yelling, “OW! My thumb!” And to top it all off, there’s a constant rendition of “Turkey in the Straw” being played through-out the course. It was fun.

Man, I’m all good with the talking animals, but if I had to listen to Turkey in the Straw for a whole course, I’d be taking a shot-gun to the speakers. And I’m a non-violent, Buddhist, vegetarian. But, seriously, after living in the city of Chicago for 30 some years, and hearing those awful ice cream trucks playing “Turkey in the Straw” over and over and over all summer, I JUST don’t think I could stay on this course!!! Good thing it was Aaron playing this without me!!!

Look at this clearly designated teeing-off spot. The transition from the tee to the green was not completely smooth, though, which bothered Mom. It occasionally caused her ball to bounce upon hitting that division, leading to less-than-accurate putts.

I love Old MacDonald and Duke in the boat!! Humans should take their companions on lovely outings like this!! Yay!!

They had some pretty interesting holes, but even when they didn’t, the course’s ambiance was so much fun. These sheep would say “good shot!” every once in awhile. It seemed like some holes actually had motion sensors to make the animals comment on your shot. But on other holes, it seemed as if the animals just spoke periodically.

The right path on this goat hole became a water hazard!

This pig, as he crossed out the “country ham” sign, muttered “hasn’t anybody heard about turkey bacon?!"

Or SOY BACON!!! I LOVE soy bacon!!! I made some for my brother, Dave, while he was visiting the week before last!! He said it tasted like a meat cracker. Whatever that would be. Also: another big BUTT for our big BUTT blog!!!

When pigs fly!

These horses also commented on your shot. This was one with a motion sensor.

The scarecrow father and son. The scarecrow father was telling his son how to be a good scarecrow . . . and obviously not succeeding!

Don’t those look like the old Warner Brother’s cartoon crows?? Heckle and Jeckle?? Did these guys pay royalties on Heckle and Jeckle??

Snorkeling goose. Or is it a duck?

Well, at least it’s not walking along the side of I-88!!!

Pigs on a see-saw!

Rabbits!

This looks like Evanston!! Where we are over-run with suicidal bunnies!! Seriously, if you bike at night, they’ll run right out in front of your bike!! Watch out!!!

On hole 18, you got an automatic score of 1 no matter what. But the question was whether or not you won a free game.

We won three free games. That was from three of us taking three shots each (one in each of our three games). Dad won two games and I won one, allowing us to play a free fourth round.

Par: 39
Aaron: 45
Barb: 42
Paul: 45

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 2 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 8.5 balls. I really loved this course. I had a blast, plain and simple.

Coming soon: Ripley’s Old MacDonald’s Farm Golf - “Porky Putts”

The Evolution of Miniature Golf

2010-07-12T01:19:00.002-05:00

In 1938 Joseph and Robert Taylor introduced into minigolf a complex course with obstacles. Their fantastical course included a castle, a wishing well, and a windmill. (All the things that I’ve thought of as standards in minigolf!!) It was so popular that the brothers began to export it, building replicas of their course in towns and cities across the US.

During the Great Depression, miniature golf was considered "big business" and one of the few businesses that could be successful in that economic climate. Over 25,000 courses were built during this period. It became the most popular entertainment for people of all ages.

There were stories of 12-year-old boys, during the Great Depression, that for an initial investment of 90 cents would set up a miniature golf course in a vacant lot and turn a 1,000% profit over the weekend. I can’t tell if these stories are true, but I do know that people were making courses out of junk and spare parts: tractor tires, old tin cans and rusted down-spouts were all re-purposed for Depression-era minigolf. Some of these courses were built underneath billboards, so that the light that illuminated the billboards at night would light the minigolf course for free!! People played at all hours of the day and night!!

Six thousand Tom Thumb courses were built during the depression. They were the first "brand" of miniature golf. It was said a Tom Thumb course could be built and open to the public in six days. (You’ll recall that the Tom Thumb courses were the ones patented by Garnet Carter. If you don’t, you can go back and read our post from June 28th.)

But, the Taylor brothers were making the Tom Thumb courses a thing of the past. By the early 1940s, Joe and Bob formed Taylor Brothers, and not only built courses all over the United States, but also supplied obstacles to others who were building courses independently. During both the Korean and Vietnam Wars, many a G.I. played on a Taylor Brothers prefabricated course that the U.S. Military had contracted to be built and shipped overseas. (That is just amazing to me!! Those of us who came of age protesting the war in Vietnam just never dreamed that minigolf was in any way involved in that war.)

You know, I ordered a pizza on-line for the first time yesterday. I hadn’t ordered ANY food delivery in a number of years, on account of I got out of the habit when I was living in my coach house. I couldn’t even get mail back there, so how on earth could I have gotten something delivered??

Anyway, when my brother was visiting, he had said, why not order pizza?? Well, I finally got around to it yesterday. There’s a Pizza Hut just a couple blocks from my house, so I went on-line to see their menu (and to get their phone number) and realized that I could just ORDER the pizza on-line!! Who knew?!?!?! It was for me AND my cousin (who eats sausage - ew) and he wanted me to get a half-veggie half-sausage pizza. When I clicked that selection, I realized that they were ILLUSTRATING our order every step of the way!! THAT was remarkable!! Our pizza-picture suddenly was half nasty sausage!! When we added Pepsi - a bottle of Pepsi appeared in the picture - everything we ordered was in the picture!! It was amazing!!

Or, was it really sad?? Was it on account of a lot of people can’t read any more?? Which made me think of an article I read a couple of years ago about how the development of a written language fundamentally changed human society forever. This article talked about how a written language, which was processed primarily in the left-brain, really stimulated left-brain activity in society as a whole.

Now that I’m talking about it, it seems as if this may have been really STRETCHING to reach its conclusions. It went on to say that the demise of matriarchal societies had something to do with the rise of written language. And further, that the computer mouse was the hope of the future, because using a mouse requires using both hemispheres of your brain - because you’re doing spatial tasks as well as written language tasks.

Well, even if it WAS a slightly exaggerated article, it’s interesting to think about right-left hemisphere issues. And also, think about this: the Tibetan written language was developed specifically in order to write down the teachings of the Buddha!! Kinda makes you want to run out and learn Tibetan, doesn’t it???

But, back to the step forward in minigolf which brought us out of the literal miniature golf with decorations, and into the era of decorations as obstacles. We’ve recently played a number of courses that were really throw-backs to the 1920s. In fact, I’m beginning to wonder if the trend in newer minigolf courses isn’t to be more like those courses.

I have to say, I am still a fan of the unique and the goofy. Give me Darth Vader with Anime eyes and a bar-be-que skewer any day over a franchise with identical windmills!!

Coming soon: more Dollywood Adventures!!!

All illustrations ©2010 Michael James.

Hillbilly Golf

2010-07-09T05:07:00.002-05:00

NOTE: You can click on the embedded photos to make them larger.

Another Note: For this entry, the BLACK text is Aaron speaking. The PINK text is Aunt Peg speaking. Also, as usual, you can click on the embedded photos to enlarge them.

Dear Aunt Peg:

This course, in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, advertised itself as “The World’s Most Unusual Miniature golf course”. I feel it failed to live up to that description - to me it seemed quite bland. At one point during the course, due to the heat and the surroundings, I felt that they could’ve re-named this course “rainforest golf” and you wouldn’t even notice a difference - save for the farming equipment on the course.

There were two notable things about this course. One is that it’s very expensive. Which is why we only played one course out of their two.

The second thing to note is that this course is on the side of the mountain - so you have to take a lift up to the top of the course.

They had your favorite metal putters, though. I don’t prefer them. I think they’re unwieldy. They’re too heavy on the club end.

The lift takes you up backwards! Dad was NOT pleased about that!

I think that looks delightful!!

They actually took you up pretty slowly.

Yeah, but Aaron was comparing that slow trip to a Dollywood roller coaster, I happen to know!

It was a good thing this course was shady, because when we played it was 95 degrees. And buggy.

I’m intrigued by the rule that says that putters are for hitting the ball only. Like you’ve got to say that????

The holes were interesting. They were astro-turf, but, because the course was on the side of a mountain, all the holes had side-rails that were completely dead - when you hit them your ball came to a complete halt. So you couldn’t do anything with bank shots or anything.

The cups were normal - what a relief after Professor Hacker!!

The first really interesting hole was this one where you had to putt through a covered wagon. It was really more “farming golf” if you ask me.

Oh, man, if your ball comes to a stop inside the covered wagon, do you crawl in there and putt from inside it?? Like at Skokie Sports Park where we had to putt from under the elephant??

The first time I hit my ball in here it came right back because it’s WAY shallower than it looks. Once you get it in the hole in the cave it emerges on this lower tier.

OMIGOD!!! Is this a MOONSHINER’s shack???? I hope so!!

They pretty much just littered the course with farm equipment - I don’t see how it fit the HillBilly theme at all.

But, what ARE HillBillies, anyway?? I mean, really?? The only thing we know about them is what we saw on The Beverly HillBillies. So, they eat opossums. That’s all I know!! And then, Granny dies and founds a scholarship for excellent actors.

And what about this sign saying to watch children at all times!! Watch YOUR children?? Watch any children in your line of sight?? What’s going on here?? Are there DANCING children????

This hole reminded me of Donkey Kong.

MAN!! Me, too!! I LOVED that game!! I played that game with my brother Dave!! He’s so generous!!! I SUCK as a player, and he carried us through - I think the whole Donkey Kong franchise!!

Then for the ball-return hole, they had you putt into the outhouse.

OK, that ball-return would’ve raised the entire course one point in the ratings had I been handing out the points. HA!!! That is hilarious. More outhouse golf, that’s what we all need. It reminds of of that two-story outhouse that is such a tourist attraction in Mattoon, Illinois!!

Statistics:

Par: 41
Aaron: 46
Barb: 45
Paul: 47

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 3 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 6 balls. The course was fine, and the scenery was certainly nice. But the course was over-priced, and it was neither especially entertaining or unusual.

Coming soon: Ripley’s Old MacDonald’s Farm Golf . . . or, more minigolf history!!

Astro Turf

2010-07-06T04:20:00.007-05:00

NOTE: You can click on the embedded photos to make them larger.

Astro Turf.

I don’t think I’d ever played a minigolf course with Astro Turf before this summer. It takes some getting used to. The courses with Astro Turf seem to be in better shape than the other courses, though. And the balls roll truer on Astro Turf.

You’d think Astro Turf was invented for the Houston Astros - for the Astro Dome, right?? In fact, during the 50s and 60s there was a lot of interest in improving the physical fitness of young people. Remember those awful President’s Physical Fitness tests we had to do during the Kennedy Administration??

In any case, the Ford Foundation was sponsoring studies to find the perfect urban sports surface for schools. Chemstrand worked from 1962 to 1966 on this project. The criteria for these surfaces were foot traction, cushioning, wear resistance, weather drainage, and flammability, among others.

In 1964, they installed a synthetic turf called Chemgrass at the Moses Brown School in Providence, Rhode Island. This was the first really major installation of synthetic turf. In 1965, when the Astro Dome was built, they renamed the turf Astro Turf. Now we use Astro Turf as a general word meaning any kind of artificial turf, even though there are gazillions of other patented turfs. Kinda like we use the word Kleenex. Or Xerox. Or, possibly only old people use those words generically. I notice my students don’t talk about Xeroxing stuff any more.

(I can’t help mentioning this: “Astroturfing” is a new political term!! I just learned this in researching this blog entry!! It means to use professional political machinery to make something appear to be a grass roots politcal movement!! Who knew???)

Chemgrass, the developer of Astro Turf, was a subsidiary of Monsanto. MAN, what a strange company THAT is!! On the one hand, Monsanto is responsible for: DDT, Agent Orange (I know, Dow Chemical made it, too), Bovine Growth Hormone, Saccharin, Round-Up, and Round-Up ready soybeans. AND they’re working on patenting pigs!!! (OK, ok, it’s complicated to explain, but they’re using a breeding technique on pigs that they hope will allow them to claim a patent on the resulting pigs).

On the other hand, they’ve been the corporate sponsor of a huge number of attractions at Disneyland and Walt Disney World. Including: the Magic Eye Theatre at Epcot, the Hall of Chemistry, and Fashions and Fabrics through the Years at Disneyland. Most hilariously, they were the sponsors of the Monsanto House of the Future at Disneyland.

The House of the Future opened in 1957. It had a 10 year run, during which time it had more than 20 million visitors. It was a mostly plastic house, and featured insulated glass walls, picture telephones, microwave ovens (come on, in 1957!!), electric toothbrushes, plastic chairs, ULTRASONIC DISHWASHERS, atomic food preservation, and plastic sinks with adjustable heights!! When they finally decided to demolish it in 1957, the wrecking ball just bounced off it, and they ended up having to get a crew to demolish it by hand. It was nearly indestructible!!

Remember the phrase “Better Living Through Chemistry”?? I guess mostly Hippies used that phrase. Well, it wasn’t Monsanto’s phrase - although, I think it should’ve been. It was DuPont’s. The original slogan was, “Better Things for Better Living . . . Through Chemistry”. That was DuPont’s slogan from 1935 through 1982. In 1982 they dropped the “Through Chemistry” portion. Perhaps because Hippies had co-opted it!!!

Anyway, Astro Turf. You know, putting surfaces are a huge part of the history of minigolf. The reason courses could be built so cheaply, and consequently be affordable to play, was artificial putting surfaces. Still, I’ve got to say, I’m beginning to long for a real grass minigolf course. I wonder if there is one??

Coming soon: More adventures in Dollywood!!

All illustrations ©2010 Michael James

Professor Hacker's Lost Treasure Golf

2010-07-01T21:47:00.002-05:00

Note: For this entry, the BLACK text is Aaron speaking. The PINK text is Aunt Peg speaking. Also, as usual, you can click on the embedded photos to enlarge them.

Professor Hacker’s Lost Treasure Golf - The Diamond Course

Dear Aunt Peg,

Here we are in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee.

REALLY?? Aaron’s family went to DOLLYWOOD???? You know, I was all ready to scoff about Dollywood, and then I did some quick on-line research and discovered that Dolly Parton invested in this theme park in order to bring jobs to her community. In fact, Dollywood, with 3,000 employees, is the largest employer in that community. So, now I’m feeling like an idiot, because it turns out she’s just trying to bring home some jobs!! Dollywood is celebrating its 25th year as Dollywood, but it’s been a theme park under a bunch of different names since it was built in 1961. It was “Rebel Railroad” and “Goldrush Junction” and then “Silver Dollar City” before she bought in.

There are so many minigolf courses here - it’s really amazing. In the amount of time we are staying here we don’t have time to play nearly all of them!! There’s Firehouse Golf, Tom Sawyer’s Minigolf, a creepy looking Circus Golf, and quite a few others.

Why are there so many minigolf courses there?? Is it just on account of this is an entertainment mecca??

The course we played today was Professor Hacker’s Lost Treasure Golf. In this course you follow the adventures of Professor Hacker as he goes on his 1932 and 1934 treasure hunt expeditions. Professor Hacker looks remarkably like Henry Hatsworth, by the way.

Who on earth is Henry Hatsworth?? Turns out it’s a DS game. Who knew??

The first thing you notice about this course is that it has GREAT scenery. They invested a LOT of money in the setting of this course. They have a pirate ship, an airplane, and a lot of caves. You PLAY through the caves!!

Good thing you play through those caves - I’m thinking Tennessee in the summer is hot and sweltering.

They give you wooden signs, in order to get you in the mood - and to properly follow Professor Hacker’s adventure. These ranged from background information (Look!! He’s from the University of Chicago!) to information about what part of his expedition you’re recreating.

I especially like the Denver College of SOIL.

They had cute little plastic clubs for small children - even though this course was not great for kids - the course was pretty unforgiving. And with a low par, that’s discouraging for everyone!

You can pose with Professor Hacker - they’ll take your photo and sell it to you.

To get to the beginning of the course you ride a mining train to the top of the hill. Unfortunately, you had to wait for the train, and then the train ride wasn’t very scenic. For the second course we just took the stairs to the top of the course, which took about 30 seconds.

Oh, but I LOVE trains!! I ride the Amtrak and the Metra and the el whenever I can!! I bet I would’ve LOVED the funny mining train - I wouldn’t have minded waiting!

They DID have the type of putters that we like - the type with the line on the top. And they had the short variety of astro-turf. So, the course played true. However, the course was unforgiving. Many of the holes were anthills. Even the holes that weren’t actually anthills had lips, so that even if you got close to the holes you’d never roll in. I had a lot of 4s and 5s on this course.

Aaron rarely gets 4s and 5s. This must’ve been REALLY frustrating!!!

Again, the scenery was great.

OK, is that waterfall blue??? Do ALL minigolf courses have to put that blue stuff in their water?? What’s up with that?? I’m going to have to look into it!!

Their weird hole-in-one scheme on the “mystery hole” was interesting. They assigned a random hole each day to be the “mystery hole” and if you happened to get a hole-in-one on that hole you’d win a free game. You couldn’t find out ‘til you’d finished your game which hole it was. But, since we never got a hole-in-one on ANY hole, it was a moot point.

Interesting!!

We started on the Diamond Course. They had really handsome signs telling which hole you were on. Although, it was unclear where you were supposed to put your ball.

I actually prefer NOT to be told where to put my ball!! I LIKE choosing my spot!!! I think it’s part of the fun and interesting strategy!! Plus, I’m not such a good rule-follower.

The holes were mostly flat, linear and uninteresting. It was the scenery that was the interesting part of this course. For instance, this is the old palace dungeon.

My brother Dave was here visiting while Aaron was off in Dollywood. When Dave saw the photo of this cave he said, “what’s the door for?” YEAH!!! What IS it for??? Are there prisoners in there????

Here are some of the holes we saw on the course, including one that went under a bridge.

Wow, no kidding!! There ARE a lot of straight-forward, uninteresting holes!!

Look! A Mayan temple!

Now, if only you putted your ball into an elevator that took you to the top of that temple, and then you could watch your ball bounce back down the side and roll into a trough . . .

This was an interesting hole - two different putting options.

See, these were the metal cups that were BALL-REPELLANT!!!!

This hole allowed you to putt off onto the sidewalk.

??????? !!!!!!

LOOK!! It’s Mom sitting on the box of dynamite!!

That’s BARB to me!!!

This hole you played through the pirate ship. But it was still boring.

There was a live duck sitting on a part of the scenery.

I love live ducks!! This one is particularly handsome. I’d even marry him. If I wasn’t completely DONE with getting married!!

Statistics:

Par: 40
Aaron: 53
Barb: 52
Paul: 48

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 4.5 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 5 balls - looks great, but it’s frustrating. PLUS, even though they have those little plastic putters - it’s NOT kid-friendly!!

Professor Hacker’s Lost Treasure Golf - The Gold Course

Look at the lovely Gold hole markers.

OH, it looks like they’ve played after dinner!! Doesn’t it look as if it’s getting dark out??

The first hole of the Gold Course is inside a cave.

Oh.

Here’s a good over-view of the course.

In this hole, you putt up - it goes into whatever hole it feels like going into, and then comes out one of three different exit pipes.

Ah, here are all the lost balls. I’ve put red squares around for easier viewing, as there were a myriad of them. We never lost ours, so I’m not sure whether or not the front desk handed out free replacements.

This hole had a mean gap. Not a great idea on such a non-kid-friendly course with ball-repellant cups!! My ball went flying off into the landscaping. Rats!

This hole was really steep. You really needed someone at the bottom of the hill when you putted in order to catch your ball before it flew out into the lake.

YIPES!!!

Statistics:

Par: 40
Aaron: 54
Barb: 54
Paul: 54

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 4.5 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 5 balls - looks great, but it’s frustrating. PLUS, even though they have those little plastic putters - it’s NOT kid-friendly!!

Coming next: Hillbilly Golf!

Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure © Nintendo and EA.

Miniature Golf's Beginnings

2010-06-28T13:48:00.010-05:00

Although the first miniature golf course in the United States was built in 1916 (by James Barber of Pinehurst, North Carolina) I think most people agree that Garnet Carter was truly the Father of Modern Minigolf.

Garnet Carter was the first person to patent a game of miniature golf. He patented it under the name “Tom Thumb Golf” in 1927. And it really was kind of an accident.

He owned a hotel at Lookout Mountain in Tennessee, and he built a regulation golf course to draw customers to his business. (HA!! I originally typed costumers!! Let’s imagine if he wanted hundreds of costumers playing golf at his course!! That would be festive!!)

Anyway, near the clubhouse he built a putting green. You could putt while waiting for your tee time, or to warm up, or whatever. Carter noticed that people were spending WAY more time than he had anticipated on the putting green before finally teeing off. He jokingly referred to this little putting green as his “Tom Thumb course”.

It was so popular that he decided to charge a fee for playing the little “Tom Thumb course” and even the fee didn’t keep its popularity from increasing.
Eventually he created a whole 18 hole course in miniature, and got his wife, Frieda Carter, to decorate it with fairies and gnomes (ah - the fabulous garden gnomes!! What AREN’T they good for?!)

His first course, at Lookout Mountain, and the other Tom Thumb courses that were built subsequently to be like it, were all actually MINIATURE golf courses. You know, they had miniature dog-legs, and miniature roughs, and miniature sand traps - just like regulation golf.

Man, I was driving out to DeKalb to visit my dad yesterday. I was driving on I-88. And, on the side of the road, there was a line of geese - walking on the shoulder!! Seriously, there must’ve been 200 of them. Adults, teenagers - all single-file. Kind of trudging along. Some of them were awfully close to getting in the far right lane- I was worried about them. The cars were whipping by at 85 mph (what can I say - Chicago drivers). But, what was going on there?? Has anyone ever heard of such a thing?? If they were travelling in a group, why weren’t they flying?? It seemed somehow so sad - I felt as if they ought to be carrying sad little goose luggage to their new homes or something.

I couldn’t stand not knowing, so I just did some on-line research. This is amazing!! It turns out, geese can't fly while they’re molting, which usually takes place in mid June to mid July!! Which is right now!!! So, the goosey parade was on account of it was molting season!!! Who knew??

The web-sites I visited said that geese are grazing animals, so they often like to walk in order to graze, but I don’t think that’s what was going on - I don’t think there’s much good grazing on the shoulder of the express-way!!

So, back to the minigolf history.

So, Garnet Carter THOUGHT he was building a golf course for children, but, to his surprise the course was taken over by adults, who enjoyed the fairy-land setting and enjoyed the challenge and hilarity of putting a ball through the miniaturized fairways.

Carter began manufacturing courses for national distribution under the patented name Tom Thumb Golf. By 1930 there were over 25,000 miniature golf courses in the U.S. In 1932, he sold the rights, and used the profits to open Frieda's Rock City Gardens.

But just think about it: in 1927 Garnet Carter invented minigolf, and just 3 years later there were 25,000 courses in the U.S. That’s really amazing. Especially considering the Stock Market Crash happened in October of 1929. You know, that means there were on average 25 courses built every day during that three year period!! Whoa!!!

Coming next: guest golfing in DOLLYWOOD!!!!!

Santa Fe Trails Mini Golf

2010-06-25T06:29:00.005-05:00

NOTE: You can click on the embedded photos to make them larger.

So, after our funny warm-up at the Sugar Grove Miniature Golf, we went about a quarter block further south on Route 47 and found the place we had originally set out to find: The Sugar Grove Family Fun Center.

This place has all kinds of entertainments - they’ve got some sort of bumper-cars. Only they’re boats. I think. I really didn’t understand it. Don’t bumper-boats sound like a recipe for disaster??

In any case, this place is some sort of relative of the funny Sugar Grove Miniature Golf and Driving Range. But, the vibe at the two places couldn’t be more different.

This course was true MINIATURE golf. Where each hole is like a regulation golf hole, with rough and slopes and all. And there’s a sort-of Wild West theme going on, too.

This was Aaron’s favorite course, by far. Also, it was the course where Aaron’s golfing suddenly took a leap forward, which may account for part of his enthusiasm. But also, it was just a fun course. We played in near-rain. And the astro-turf was SOAKED (that’s my excuse for such a poor score!!). We definitely want to go back and play again in better conditions.

I think the thing I liked the most about this course was that a whole BUNCH of baby frogs had just metamorphosed from tadpoles to froggies and were hopping EVERYWHERE on certain holes!! I spoke with the woman at the front desk - I didn’t know if these were some sort of rare miniature frogs (on account of the miniature golf - ar, ar) or if they were truly babies.

She said they were babies, and that they hatch every year here!! She said most of them get eaten by the birds, though!! Wow. Nature is brutal. I asked where they lived and she said, “in the pond”. I said, you mean, that pond with all the BLUE water??? Because, I just couldn’t stop taking pictures of the blue water. It was like Tidy-Bowl!! Seriously, all those little blue babbling brooks and such.

She said, oh, that blue coloring, isn’t it nice?? And it’s eco-friendly. Really!! Well, I guess if frogs can hatch in it every year . . .

Oh, look!! A tunnel conveniently provided for cleaning the rain off your glasses during the game!!

Seriously, the really delightful thing about this course was talking about what might be the best strategy to get to the hole in the fewest strokes. There were a lot of differently shaped fairways.

Statistics:

Par: 46
Aaron: 49
Peg: 58

Difficulty (1-6 putts, 6 putts being the most difficult): 4 putts
Rating (1-10 balls, 10 being the most wondrous): 8 balls

Although this was Aaron’s favorite course so far, it was too serious for me. Not enough goofy creations. My favorite course so far is still good old Novelty Golf on Devon!!

Coming soon: Guest reviews from Tennessee!