It was nice to hear that bun throwing was featured in the Abingdon Herald and Oxford Mail this week with a look at the town's bizarre and ancient tradition.
It was fun that a photo of me throwing a bun at the Royal Bun Throwing Championships in 2012 was included in the piece too!
You can see the article on the Abingdon Herald and Oxford Mail websites.
My old local Blockbuster was on Park Street in Luton, Bedfordshire. Living very close by for many years I walked past the store on a daily basis, and probably popped in every other day while at uni.
We were recently back in Luton and had to take a look. The shop is still somewhat recognisable from its time as a video shop (if you know what you're looking for), with Blockbuster blue paintwork and the space where the QuikDrop box once was still framed.
The former Blockbuster store is now the Welcome Supermarket
A windowed space sits where the QuikDrop box used to be
Check out my blog posts about other former Blockbuster Video stores in:
There are plans for a new entertainment centre in Belfast city centre.
Part of the former Debenhams store in Belfast is planned to become an entertainment centre with a crazy golf course, laser tag, escape rooms, VR experiences and more.
The new indoor minigolf course at CastleCourt in Belfast will be another new course and venue for us to visit on a return trip to Northern Ireland on our Crazy World of Minigolf Tour.
The last few years has seen a number of former retail units becoming entertainment venues with a fair few minigolf, crazy golf and adventure golf layouts setting up shop in the locations.
With the demise of Debenhams as a high street presence there is a lot of empty real estate open to the opportunity that retailtainment offers.
A look at the Adventure Golf course at the Pleasure Beach Gardens in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk.
My brother, and founding member of the Crazy World of Minigolf Tour, Christopher was in Great Yarmouth recently and sent me some snaps from the Pleasure Beach Gardens.
My brother, and charter member of the Crazy World of Minigolf Tour, Christopher was recently in Great Yarmouth and sent me this snap of the sign at Merrivale Model Village as it includes Crazy Golf.
There's a crazy golf course on the beach in Great Yarmouth.
My brother Christopher found a minigolf course on the beach in Great Yarmouth, Norfolk on his visit to the seaside resort yesterday!
Great Yarmouth was one of the first places we visited on our Crazy World of Minigolf Tour and we've been back a number of times, although not since July 2016! It'll be fun to revisit and see what else is new there.
With Christopher's discovery of the Great Yarmouth Beach Golf course it brings the grand total of miniature golf courses visited by members of the Crazy World of Minigolf Tour to 992 since September 2006!
Summerween is celebrated annually on the 22nd June.
A Summerween Jack-o-Melon
The quirky holiday originated in Gravity Falls, Oregon and in some calendars is also marked on the second to last Friday of the month of June. That was last Friday, the 18th.
So you get two bites of the cherry (or should that be watermelon) to celebrate this made up event.
A look at the new Wardown Adventure Golf course in Luton.
We were back in our old home town of Luton, Bedfordshire on Saturday 19th June and while there swung by the new Adventure Golf course at Wardown Park.
The new Wardown Adventure Golf course opened in the park last month. It's a nice looking layout.
Wardown Park's first miniature golf course opened on the 19th June 1934 - so our visit came 87 years to the day since the first putt was taken in the park!
The 18-hole woodland-themed minigolf course is on an elevated bowling green in the park
Unfortunately we didn't have time for a game on the 18-hole course during our flying visit to the town. However, it was very nice to see the course proving popular with players.
It's nice to see a disused bowling green put to good use
We're looking forward to spending some time having some rounds there on our Crazy World of Minigolf Tour in the future.
The countdown is on to the launch of the Filwood Fantastic Mini Golf Club's new Crazy Golf course in Knowle West.
The Filwood Fantastic Mini Golf Club is getting ready to tee-off on the brand new community designed miniature golf course at the Filwood Community Centre in Knowle West, Bristol next month.
My friend and world traveller PJ Goedhals sent me some snaps from his visit to the music-themed minigolf course at O'Learys sports bar in Norrtull, Sweden in 2019.
Playing the Crazy Golf course on Blackpool's North Shore.
I finally got to play the Crazy Golf course on Blackpool's North Shore as it reopened last month. We've been to the course a number of times on our Crazy World of Minigolf Tour over the years but it had always been closed.
The base of the course itself has changed very little since it was first created in the late 1950's and it's wonderful that the area is easily recognisable from old postcards from the 1960s, 70s and 80s.
There have still been some noticeable improvements to the course and the whole area it sits in. Most notable are the repairs to the obstacles as well as the addition of professional putting carpet to the holes. It makes the course very nice to play.
Here are videos of me playing the crazy golf course on Blackpool's North Shore at the launch event on Friday 28th May 2021.
The course is now open to play at weekends with plans to increase the opening times in the future. Take a look at the Princess Parade Crazy Golf Facebook Group for more information.
It's been a pleasure to be a part of the Princess Parade Crazy Golf project and I've enjoyed working with the teams at Blackpool Fulfilling Lives and Blackpool & the Fylde Street Angels, Blackpool Council and the Blackpool Civic Trust to get the course reopened.
We're looking forward to getting back to Blackpool again later this summer and playing a few more rounds on the course.
A new Adventure Golf course is opening in Farnham, Surrey next month.
A big thanks go to my friend and fellow minigolf fanatic Matt Dodd for letting me know about the new 18-hole Junglemania Adventure Golf course opening in Farnham, Surrey on the 23rd of July.
It's another new course for us to visit on our Crazy World of Minigolf Tour when we're next down in Surrey. We haven't played a jungle theme for a while.
The new Swingers Crazy Golf venue opens in Washington D.C. this week.
The first Swingers Crazy Golf location in the USA is opening at Dupont Circle in Washington D.C. tomorrow (Friday 18th June).
There are already plans for a second Swingers Crazy Golf in the US with courses being built at the new Virgin Hotel on Broadway in the Flatiron District of New York City.
We played the first Swingers Crazy Golf pop-up course on our Crazy World of Minigolf Tour in Shoreditch back in September 2014. The brand has grown since then, with Swingers in The City opening next to the Gherkin in 2016 and Swingers West End following in 2018.
Emily about to score a hole in one on hole 4 of the Swingers Crazy Golf course in London's West End
The indoor miniature golf layout will be designed with a local landmark theme.
The plans are the latest to tap into the retailtainment trend bringing entertainment and leisure to high streets, shopping centres and retail parks.
Emily is a big fan of escape rooms too and we haven't been to Scotland together since the 2014 Commonwealth Games. It'll be nice to have a holiday up there again in the future and swing by the new venue on our Crazy World of Minigolf Tour.
I've been blogging about minigolf during the time of coronavirus and posting examples of Covid-19 and social distancing signage that I've seen or had shared with me during the pandemic.
During the pandemic we've played four minigolf courses, two of which were indoors. Last August we played our first game following lockdown at Gator Adventure Golf in Chorley. In September we played at Cae Glas Park in Oswestry. Last month we played at the newly refurbished Princess Parade Crazy Golf in Blackpool and earlier this month we played two of the three indoor courses at Puttstars in Rochdale.
A social distancing sign at the entrance to Rochdale Riverside
We didn't take the lift
The approach to Puttstars
A welcome sign
Hole one of the Slingshot course
A sign at the end of the round
Away from minigolf I've been documenting all of the Covid-19 signs I've seen on my Instagram account.