Em and I are always trying to think of new date ideas. There’s the traditional date ideas like dinner and a movie. And then there are the over-the-top “Let’s fly to Las Vegas for the weekend” date ideas. In my mind, these two dates have one thing in common: they both cost money! That’s why our dates typically consist of eating in and watching a movie on our laptop. But sometimes its good to get out of the apartment and do something new. That is how my idea for night golf was born.
Now first, I’m not ashamed to say that I am an awful golfer. The first time I went to a pitch and putt course, I quickly realized I did not have any of the qualities that make up a good golfer. I don’t have the patience, the skill, or the money! But at the same time, I think the idea of golfing is pretty fun! Any sport where you get to whack a ball as far as you can is pretty exciting and somewhat therapeutic. But reality sets in when I look up and see that my ball barely got off the ground, sliced way off the course into the woods, and that I now have to go walk to find the ball.
Night golf takes care of most of those issues. It probably shouldn’t even be called golf, because all it really consists of is walking out on the golf hole behind our apartment and hitting a box full of golf balls in the pitch dark. But I love it because the darkness solves a lot of my golfing issues. First, no one can see you – so you really are as cool as you think you look. Second, since our headlamps are our only source of light, I have convinced myself that any shot that went beyond the beam of my headlamp was a great, straight shot (Em does not like this, however, because all the pictures we took are too dark to see anything at all). Third, you don’t have to worry about the traditional golfing etiquette like being quiet or dressing up in a polo and khaki shorts.
We did still try to walk around and collect all of the balls we hit. Most were not too hard to find since they had only traveled 10 feet from where we were standing. But then, of course the more we found, the less we could resist the urge to wind up and hit them again! I think we ended up only finding about half the balls we started with and we may not have done much to improve our day-time golf game…but we had a great night just laughing, making fun of ourselves, and making new memories.
As we were walking back to our apartment, Em said “Why we don’t we sleep outside tonight?!” So we hung up our ENO hammocks in the trees behind our apartment and had a great night! We recently got bug nets from ENO, which were amazing at protecting us from being eaten alive by the mosquitos. Here’s a photo of Em in the morning!
We’ve been using our ENOs a lot this summer – not just outside our apartment, but also camping and at the beach. Here is a photo of Em and her sisters hammocking together at the beach.
Anyway, sleeping in the ENOs made for a great end to a really fun night. Although it may not have been a weekend in Las Vegas, but it was a fun memory – and if they ever decide to add night golf to the Olympics, we’ll be ready!
