Friday, April 13, 2012

Visiting a further 49 Minigolf and Crazy Golf courses in England and Scotland

Exploring the north west of England, some of Scotland and the north east coast.

The latest leg on our Crazy World of Minigolf Tour has seen us visit a further 49 miniature golf courses in England and Scotland bringing the total course location visits to date since September 2006 to 495!


The 1,178 mile roadtrip took us to Miniature Golf, Crazy Golf, Putting and Adventure Golf courses in Forton, Garstang, Bispham, Morecambe, Bowness-on-Windermere, Brockhole, Ambleside, Keswick, Maryport, Silloth-on-Solway, Carlisle, Helensburgh, Bannockburn, Perth, Broughty Ferry, St Andrews, Kirkaldy, Dunfermline, North Berwick, Gullane, Dunbar, Berwick-upon-Tweed, Spittal, Seahouses and Sunderland.


Miniature Golf, Crazy Golf, Putting and Adventure Golf courses in Forton, Garstang, Bispham, Morecambe, Bowness-on-Windermere, Brockhole, Ambleside, Keswick, Maryport, Silloth-on-Solway, Carlisle, Helensburgh, Bannockburn, Perth, Broughty Ferry, St Andrews, Kirkaldy, Dunfermline, North Berwick, Gullane, Dunbar, Berwick-upon-Tweed, Spittal, Seahouses and Sunderland
North West England, Scotland & North East England Tour Challenge - List of courses played (click to enlarge)

On the trip Emily and I contested an Irregular Mini Golf Tour tournament played over 13 rounds and 201 different minigolf holes – the North West England, Scotland & North East England Tour Challenge. The competition was won by me with a total of 518 to Emily’s 554.

Our visit to St Andrews in Scotland also saw us visit and play the World’s First Miniature Golf course at The Himalayas Putting Course – a terrific minigolf location where there is a pair of testing courses – an 18 and a 9-hole Grass Putting layout.

With the 49 Minigolf/Crazy Golf/Adventure Golf/Putting courses taken in on our journey we have now made 495 course location visits since 2006 and played 297 courses!

Richard at the Zumo Cafe Crazy Golf course in Forton










Richard plays a shot on the Broughty Ferry Crazy Golf course


Richard plays a shot on the 9-hole Himalayas Putting Course in St Andrews


Emily on Hole 17 at Adventure Golf Island in Dunfermline

Richard on the East Links Putting course in North Berwick

Richard on the Crazy Golf course in a very wet and cold Seahouses

According to the excellent Miniature Golf resource – MiniatureGolfer.com – there are 57 miniature golf courses in Scotland (and 618 in the UK) and in the few days we had available we managed to visit 20 courses there. We also spotted a few new unlisted courses in England and Scotland that can be added for future visits and visitors.

Related blog posts:

8 comments:

Lemony said...

A very depressingly high number of the courses were closed, demolished, unfindable, un-playable....

But the course in Perth was excellent...

The ratios are too sad to contemplate!

Richard Gottfried said...

On our tour of Scotland we had tried to find the Miniature Golf course in Stirling. The course was listed as being in King's Park, but on our visit we couldn't find it and instead ended up driving around the area near the castle for about half an hour.

Looking on the Google Satellite map image for the Crazy Golf course when we got back it looked like there was an 18-hole Eternit type of Minigolf course at King's Park, close to Stirling Golf Club.

However, our fellow Minigolfer John 'Thighs' Moore made a visit to Stirling yesterday and let us know that the course is definitely no longer there. The area where the course was is now a Skate Park.

Richard Gottfried said...

Photos of the new 7-hole Minigolf course in Sunderland can be found on MiniatureGolfer.com.

You can also play the game of 'Spot Lemony and Thighs' using the pics...

Seth Thomas said...

I've played the course in Ambleside, it's rubbish. Though a membership is very cheap for a years use of the tennis courts, bowling green and putting green that surround it.

Richard Gottfried said...

The course was tough. I'm not a big fan of the rubber 'faux' tarmac type of surface, some of the second putts were nasty.

The 18-hole Crazy Golf at Bowness-on-Windermere was the same design/build.

The Putting course looked good, as did the mini-Pitch & Putt - very close to the road to have a Pitching Wedge though!

Richard Gottfried said...

Here's the blog post and photos of the "Unplayed Minigolf Courses on our Roadtrip to Scotland & Back". Enjoy!

Richard Gottfried said...

Just spotted that a new Crazy Golf course has opened in Callander, near Stirling - http://www.stirlingobserver.co.uk/stirling-news/local-news-stirling/news-stirling/2012/09/14/crazy-golf-course-set-to-open-in-callander-51226-31830909/

Richard Gottfried said...

Check out the blog post "Crazy Golf in Seahouses, Northumberland" for more info and photos from our visit to play the course in April 2012.