2026-08-28 03:29:00
Somewhere in County Durham, dragon eggs are going missing, and the potion makers need trainee witches and wizards to help find them. It's the kind of mission that sounds thrilling until you remember you're the one herding three kids, a putter bag, and a toddler who's decided this is the moment to stage a protest about shoes.
Booking the best mini golf Blackpool has to offer is the easy part. Getting your family through nine holes without a meltdown, a lost ball down a fake moat, or a sibling standoff over whose turn it is takes a bit more planning. These parent tips for crazy golf outings come straight from watching hundreds of families tackle our courses, so you can skip the trial and error and get straight to the fun part.
Crazy golf looks simple from the outside: a putter, a ball, nine holes. In practice, it's really a small logistics exercise dressed up as a game. A little forethought turns the outing from "we survived it" into "can we go back next weekend."
Weekends and school holidays are when everyone else has the same idea you do, so if your family gets overwhelmed in crowds, aim for a weekday morning or early afternoon instead. Courses move at the pace of the slowest group ahead of you, and a queue behind an eight-ball birthday party is a real test of patience for a four-year-old.
If you can't avoid a busy slot, build in extra time before and after your round. Arriving fifteen minutes early means nobody's rushing through the entrance while trying to find the loo, and leaving room afterward means you're not sprinting to the car the second the last putt drops.
It's also worth thinking about who else is in your group before you book preparing for your first crazy golf game. A round with grandparents in tow moves at a different speed than one with just the kids, and a party of six needs a bit more planning than a family of three. If you know your group runs large or mixes a wide age range, booking ahead rather than turning up on spec means you're not waiting around for a slot to open up.
Kids get far more out of the experience when they know there's a story waiting for them. Before you even leave the house, give them the basics: dragon eggs are disappearing, the potion makers are worried, and it's up to your family to solve the mystery hole by hole. That five-minute conversation in the car does more for engagement than anything you can do once you're actually there.
This works especially well for kids who find golf itself a bit dull. Frame the outing as an adventure with a puzzle to solve, not a round of golf, and you'll get a lot less "how many more holes" partway through.
It also gives shy or anxious kids a bit of a head start. Knowing roughly what to expect, that there'll be talking portraits, a castle, and a mysterious lake, takes the edge off for children who don't love surprises. You don't need to explain every detail. Just enough to spark curiosity and settle any nerves before you walk through the door.
Nine holes sounds short, but with photos, riddles, and the occasional argument about technique, it can stretch to an hour. Know your kids' limits going in. Younger children often do better with a faster pace, so let them skip ahead to the fun bits of each story if they're losing interest, rather than insisting on a full read of every riddle.
Older kids and tweens usually want the opposite: more time to actually solve the puzzles and figure out the story properly. If your group spans both ends of that range, it helps to split into smaller teams rather than forcing everyone to move at one pace. A few things worth deciding before you start:
Whether you're doing one big group or splitting into smaller teams by age
Who's setting the pace on each hole
Whether younger kids can skip ahead if they lose interest
What the plan is if one team finishes well before another
You don't need much for a round of crazy golf, but the few things you do bring make a real difference. Comfortable shoes matter more than people expect, since there's a fair bit of walking between holes and around obstacles like the castle and the lake. A small bag with water, a snack, and a pack of wipes covers most minor emergencies without weighing you down.
Every player already gets a free magic potion drink worth £3.49, which helps with hydration, but it's not a substitute for an actual snack if you're playing close to a meal time. A hungry six-year-old and a tricky riddle are not a good combination.
A few quick essentials worth tucking into your bag before you head out:
Comfortable, closed-toe shoes for everyone, not just the kids
Water and a small snack that isn't going to melt or crumble everywhere
Wipes or hand sanitiser, especially after handling props around the course
A phone or camera charged up for the inevitable castle photo
Even the best-planned outing can hit a rough patch, usually around hole six when energy starts to dip. Rather than pushing through, build in permission to pause. Step away from the group for a minute, find a bench near the lake, and let the potion do its job. Most meltdowns are really just tiredness or overstimulation, and a short break solves more of them than any amount of reasoning does.
It also helps to lower the stakes on the scorecard before you start. If a bad hole is going to cause a genuine meltdown, agree in advance that anyone can take a "wizard's mercy" and move their ball to a better spot once per round. Nobody remembers the score a week later. They remember whether the day felt fun.
A great family outing best family crazy golf tips to Blackpool usually comes down to timing, a bit of storytelling before you arrive, and knowing your own kids well enough to pace the round around them. Book during a quieter slot if you can, get everyone excited about the mystery before you set off, pack a few practical essentials, and have a plan ready for the moment someone's energy runs low.
Do that, and the hardest part of the day won't be the golf. It'll be convincing everyone it's time to go home. Book your trainee witches and wizards in, and see if your family can help save the dragon eggs before the potion makers run out of time.
by Stuart Jarman
