Samuiscape
After watching the premier league avidly over the Christmas period, I decided to go and have a bash at football myself. This was quite a bit step for me as I have no eye to foot coordination; I am utterly useless at football and have always thought that football was a boy thing. Thanks to Tom Roberts, none of these handicaps stops me from enjoying kicking a ball around, and actually being quite good at it (after a bit of practice). Tom has created Football golf, a game that is competitive, excellent fun, great exercise, not too expensive and literally anybody can play.
The whole thing came about after Tom decided 6 years ago that he wanted to watch the world cup in Japan. Tom and his mates decided to make their way to Japan without using a plane! Not only did they make this amazing journey, named the journey after the Dutch football legend, Dennis Bergkamp who is scared to fly to try to show him the right way to go. The journey was highly publicised in the UK newspapers and unbelievably resulted in a short daily show on Japanese TV and gained them a gift from FIFA, free tickets!
During the epic journey Tom and his friends came to Thailand, and like lots of us, instantly fell in love with it. They had planned to head to Australia after the world cup, but were so taken with the Land of Smiles, they decided to return and spend some more time here.
Initially Tom was teaching English to the staff in the Samui Peninsula Hotel. After the Tsunami hit the in 2004, Koh samui saw an unparalleled boom with many visitors changing their travel plans from the Andaman Coast to the unaffected Gulf of Thailand. However for Tom the opposite was true as all his students were busy like never before in the hotel and so after a few weeks sitting in a classroom with nothing to do, Tom decided to take a different path in his life and decided to create the amazing game of football golf.
So why football golf? Tom used to play football as a kid on the beach back in the UK and to make it more interesting he and his friends used to dig holes on the beach and test their skills by trying to get a hole in one. It was quite hard work, not only because of the required digging as most of you will know running on the beach is seriously hard work. The game then moved into Tom's garden and the holes were replaced by a chair. This was far more fun because you can move the chair and put obstacles in the way of it making it more and more challenging. Tom had such fond memories of his childhood game he decided there was no reason he could not take it into adulthood and set out to rent some land and built an 18 hole football golf course, which is exactly what he has done.
I must admit when I first heard of football golf, it sounded like a bit of a mad cap idea, but it's not. Unbeknown to Tom it was already being played in Sweden, he only discovered this surfing the net after his course was completed and his friends recommended he changed the name of the game from Golf Football to Football Golf. Within weeks Tom had Swedish players enjoying the paradise version of the game and football golf officially took off in Koh Samui.
I decided to go and see what all the fuss was about and had a great time. The beauty of this game is that you can take it as seriously or light-heartedly as you like. The course is beautiful and thankfully, in this heat, it's also protected by trees and coconut palms, so it's a perfect alternative to a day on the beach when the hot Thai sunshine gets out of hand. Of the 18 holes one is a par 2, seven are par 3, seven are par 4, and three are par 5. You will encounter bunkers, bamboo hedges, hills and piles of coconuts on your way round and all need to be negotiated! The course has been designed so that any level or ability can play competitively and have laugh-out- loud fun at the same time.
There are hardly any rules to learn, basically you just have to get the ball in the hole. I won't tell you how many attempts I made on a couple of the holes! The course on average takes around an hour and ten minutes to get around, but you can take as long as you like. It's best to keep your team to a maximum of seven or less and I highly recommend trying this game at the beginning of your holiday because one round and you are hooked! I was amazed how quickly I improved and from kicking my first football at age 36 am pretty proud of my progress!
The course is open seven days a week from 9 am until 6.30 pm. There is a well stocked bar serving ice cold drinks and Tom is always on hand to give you help and advice on Koh Samui, how to improve your game as well as fascinating you with his travelling tails. Even for those of you who are not football fanatics, you can't help it but you will find Tom one of the most interesting characters on the island.
This truly is a game for everybody, from couples, to families to groups of friends looking for a good time; it's certainly one of the most entertaining afternoons I have spent on this island and one that I am certainly going to repeat.
Enjoy!
You can contact Tom on 08 9771 7498
The course is located in Choeng Mon just 10 minutes north out of Chaweng on the beach road.
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