Games for Tailgating, Fall Festivals, and BBQs
It’s that time of year again. Football season is upon us, the giant lawn skeletons are rolling in their cardboard coffins, and my seasonal conditioning is stirring a craving for pumpkin and cinnamon in ungodly culinary abominations. **shutter**
Maybe you’re a seasoned BucketGolfer or you’ve only just heard of the game but hopefully you’ll enjoy these ideas for a few ways to spice up your tailgates, fall festival, or backyard bbq’s (sans latte). These are 3 of our favorite BucketGolf game variations for fall:
BucketPong:
Arrange the buckets in a triangle formation or a diamond if you have 9 buckets and want to use all of them. Maintain a fair but challenging distance between the tee and the buckets.
If you’re playing on concrete or asphalt, we recommend grabbing one of our chipping mats. It will help protect your club from getting damaged and it helps you get a bit more lift on the ball.
If you attended college or any party in your early 20’s you probably know, typically, in cup-pong you would take turns against your opponent from opposite sides of the table but unless you have a friend that also has a BucketGolf set or you have the tour set, you probably just want to use 6-9 buckets. We’ve played two variations on this game with BucketGolf and found them to be equally challenging.
Variation 1:
Each player takes turns chipping the BucketGolf ball into the buckets from the tee. The guest or loser of the last round should take the first shot.
If they sink a shot into the bucket, remove that bucket from play. They get one point.
Continue alternating between players until no buckets are left. Winner is the player that sunk the most shots. If you end in a 3-3 tie, set up three buckets in a triangle formation and continue shooting. The first to make 2 buckets wins. You don’t need to remove buckets at this point.
Variation 2:
Set up the buckets as normal, in a triangle or diamond formation and take turns chipping the ball from the tee into the buckets.
Players earn the number of points equal to the number on the bucket. So if a player, sinks bucket 3, that bucket is removed from play and that player scores 3 points. Continue until all of the buckets are removed.
We recommend setting up the buckets with level of difficulty in consideration. For example; bucket 1 is worth one point so you might put it in the easiest spot to hit, dead middle.
If you find either of these versions just a little too challenging after your buddy has been sinking buckets on you all day or you’re playing with the kids, here are two ideas we’ve found to lower the difficulty level just enough.
- Fold half of the bucket, use the loop to keep half of the bucket folded. From there, face the open face towards the tee.
- If it’s still too much, Ditch the clubs. Just toss the ball into the buckets.
Cornhole (but make it Golf)
Yeah, I don’t have a clever name for this one yet so, if you’ve got one, hit us up! Yet another spin on a classic tailgating game, you can probably figure out how to set it up for yourself but we went ahead and made a general guide of how we’ve played.
You’ll just need two buckets and two tee boxes for this game. Put the two buckets chipping distance away from each other and put a tee box next to each one. 10-15 feet seems to be a sweet spot for chipping distance but you can increase or decrease the distance depending on the space available and how much of a challenge you’re looking for.
Starting at the same tee box, have players take alternating turns chipping one of their 3 balls at the opposite bucket.
This game works best with 2 or 4 players. For 2 players, always shoot from the same side as your opponent and switch sides when you go to pick up the balls that you just chipped. For 4 players, have one player from each team stand next to each bucket. They don’t need to switch sides. After one side hits all 6 balls, have the other players on the opposite side hit back at the other bucket.
Hitting any part of the bucket counts as one point, hitting it counts as three. You can either have points cancel out or “cover” so that only one player scores per round or just add up the number of points each player scores each round. Example: To play the cover option, player 1 hits the side of the bucket once and hits one ball in. Player 2 only hits one ball into the bucket. So, this round player 1 scores nets one point because the two balls hit into the bucket were both worth 3 points and therefore cancel each other out. This style of game lasts longer and incorporates just a bit more strategy. First to 21 wins.
Chip-or-Treat
As a kid, the only houses I remembered at Halloween were the ones that either 1) gave full sized candy bars or 2) had some kind of game that you had to play to win your candy.
This game variant combines both of those ideas by having participants chip the ball at the buckets with mystery prizes inside. In order to keep things moving, I recommend having a small prize for participants who just hit a bucket like a piece of candy. If they are able to chip it in, have a second bigger prize waiting in that bucket like a full sized candy bar.
You can arrange your buckets in just about any formation. A triangle formation works well because it offers a lot of room for error on a shot by offering a big target which just makes it a bit easier and more fun.
You’ll find some of the buckets are going to be much easier to hit or hit into so we recommend adjusting the prizes accordingly. You can swap out the prizes with pretty much anything. You're only limited by your creativity.
So, that’s three new BucketGolf variations for you to try this fall. Let us know if you enjoy them, how you’d change them or if you get any videos of awesome shots. Our team absolutely lights up when we hear feedback from customers.
