The Pirates of Plaid Pants In apparent contradiction, buccaneer themes overrun pleasant family leisure activity

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If golf is the sport of kings, then common logic makes miniature golf the sport of princes, right?

Not exactly.

Miniature golf, in fact, has nothing to do with royalty. It costs quite a bit less than “real” golf, and you can lose the plaid knickers and white sweaters in favor of gym shorts and a T-shirt.

The sport has taken a new course in the past decade or so, leaving behind clowns’ mouths and windmills in favor of something far more sinister. Har, har, har.

Pirates!

Impossible, you say? Take a look around.

While “real” golf has plastered Tiger Woods and his Aquafresh smile on everything, miniature golf subtly has pushed in its own brand of pitchmen to promote the game to a new generation.

Blackbeard and the lot have never looked so good.

Today they’re posted on billboards with their trademark scraggly beards, but with some new twists: Bright, wide eyes (or at least one eye) and even brighter, wider smiles.

Somewhere along the line, pirates were made to seem warm and inviting – think Care Bears and babies with eye patches.

Rather than drinking, cursing and fighting with swords, pirates have become more deft with pitching and putting than they ever were with pistols and cutlasses.

The transition from skullduggerous, thieving fiends to nice guys should have been difficult. There should have been apologies for all the plundering and pillaging of the past, but miniature golf developers needed a quick fix, and fast. So they let pirates off the hook.

One day someone decided the sport was losing its luster, and the developers decided all the Astroturf and lighthouses in the world wouldn’t keep the industry puttering along, so the sport had to take an even greater departure from “real” golf.

Rather than just having eye-catching obstacles, the courses needed to take on a theme that would attract children and their parents, scaring up a sense of adventure without the frustration of balls ricocheting off windmill blades.

So mini-golf’s powers that be must’ve had quite the meeting to come up with this treasure map that certainly has led to a lot of gold.

Over a bottle of rum, and a lot of saying “Aarrgghh, matey!” the idea hit this crack team of developers like a musket ball.

The idea was set and the courses wouldn’t be a problem to build. What they needed was a hook.

They needed a patron saint or two for the mini-links – full of horrible history – but apparently with scads of advertising promise.

The obvious choice was Blackbeard, who somehow has been transformed from the scourge of the sea to a misunderstood sailor.

Blackbeard, to the average person, was king of all pirates, notorious for looting anything and anyone he could get his hands on. A real-life tough guy who liked to fight with blades and make things explode.

Now that’s appeal.

A smiling face that hides a love of the dark underworld always has drawn the masses. Hey, it works for Eminem.

Blackbeard’s real history is so lost in the fog that it hasn’t been a real chore to make him out to be a hero. So he had an eye patch and a hook for a hand? We’ll forgive him his scrapping. Pirates will be pirates.

The second choice for spokespirate wasn’t so clear. He needed to be someone with history, and a tragic one at that. If Blackbeard was going to be the No. 1 guy, second fiddle had to be played by someone the mini-duffers could feel bad for, even though a course bearing his name was stealing strokes right out from under your nose.

Ladies and gentlemen, meet Capt. William Kidd.

Pirate’s Cove on Route 3 in Bar Harbor has taken an eye-opening approach to the world of miniature golf, posting bios of many pirates, glossing over history, but at the same time making it fun.

The Challenge Course at Pirate’s Cove offers a timeline of Kidd’s life. It takes the putter through Kidd’s glory days when he served the good people of the world, but quickly turns into an episode of “Behind the Music.”

By the 10th hole, Kidd has alienated his crew. On the next hole, he’s killed a fellow sailor with a bucket. The 13th hole, however, doesn’t have a chance to prove unlucky for Kidd, because he was hanged at the 12th.

However gruesome that sounds, the course is set up to make the golfer rise and fall with Kidd’s history, and an exit at the 12th hole isn’t a bad idea, because the course doesn’t get any easier from there. And it’s not as though the first few holes don’t make you feel like walking the plank.

Even with automated evildoers lurking around every corner, laughing at your feeble putting from the confines of the brig, miniature golf is about having fun. The sport lets people have fun at the expense of history and a few bucks, and it definitely beats an afternoon at the movies.

Pirate courses are scary not for their themes, but for the skill level (luck) required to play them well.

Miniature golf is great, as long as everyone obeys the rules. But not the standard “be courteous” sort of rules. Remember these next time you’re ready to fly the skull and crossbones:

. When the course rules say “No full swings,” they’re not talking about swinging your putter as though it’s a real golf club. They’re basically saying “No swordplay.”

That’s not fair, especially since you’re at a pirate-themed business. But, in order to avoid being forced to the crow’s nest (read: Your parents make you go sit in the car while the rest of the family plays golf because you poked your brother in the eye) keep the sword, sorry, putter swinging to a minimum.

. Adults: No matter how great you are at “real” golf, or miniature golf for that matter, you’ll never be as good (and definitely not as fast) as young children. Kids under the age of 7 or so move around the course like cannonballs.

And who can blame them? Pirates are especially exciting to youngsters, and these courses bill themselves with words such as “adventure.”

It is impossible to keep up with children at mini-golf events as they are prone to running after every shot they hit as soon as it leaves the face of the putter. No matter whether the hole is five feet away or it is at the bottom of a cliff, they will tap dance around their ball excitedly, regardless of their score.

Before you’ve had a chance to putt, they’ve zipped off to the next hole to plan their attack.

. Feel free to wear a bandanna and any other pirate accessories you can pick up. It helps you shoot lower scores if you’re in the right frame of mind.

Pirate courses should give bonus points, or take away strokes, for those who are spirited about their games.

And if you figure out a way to wear a hook and still manage to shoot a good score, you’ve earned the title of captain. Two hands on the club makes it hard enough.

. Finally, if you are afraid of pirates in any way and thinking about not golfing for that reason, remember that all pirates have weak spots.

For example, if you are attacked by a pirate in the middle of a round, poke him in his good eye.

After blinding him, put him on the ground by stealing his peg leg. Then, put his arm in a hammerlock and attach it to the back of his shirt using his own hook as a tool against him.

Now you have conquered your fear of pirates – and notice, you did it without swinging your putter like a sword – and you can go on to do the same with your miniature golf game.

For a real pirate adventure, check out Blackbeard’s on the Odlin Road in Bangor, or Pirate’s Cove on Route 3 in Bar Harbor. Each course offers 36 holes of miniature golf for just a few bucks. So go forth and golf – it’ll make you jolly like Roger.