The V Tree. The Paddleboat. The Shed. The Stump. The Rock. These are just a few names for the 19 holes on the annual Clown Tour Frisbee Golf Weekend held every year at the beginning of May.

For more than a decade, I trek into the bush around MacTier with a core group of longtime friends for four days of great food, lots of drink, cards, merriment and Frisbee golf.

Good friends are precious assets. For many people, they will have relationships with their best buddies longer than with spouses.

I've been blessed to have a solid group of great friends dating back to high school.

While we get together as a group at different intervals during the year, the main gathering occurs at this time of year. It's a calling to the woods.

For those unfamiliar with the other, lesser known use for the popular plastic flying disk, there is actually a game where you play golf but use a Frisbee as the ball, your arm as the driver, putter, etc., and a target for the hole.

There is an official course set up at Bronte Creek Provincial Park, and you can actually buy specially designed disks of different sizes and weights.

My best pals and I have been getting together for more than a decade to play Frisbee golf in the woods on the annual 'Clown Tour' weekend. We use trees, an old hunting shack, sign posts, rocks and rotting logs as targets.

There's no need to explain why this weekend event involves the word 'Clown'. Anytime you put seven guys out of the reach of civilization... well I think you can figure it out from there. It's a circus.

You have to appreciate that due to the complicated nature of tossing a Frisbee in a forest, and the inexorable desire of the disk to land in swamps, down ravines and buried behind trees, you need to bring along loads of aiming fluid to make the experience more enjoyable.

Aside from the Frisbee golf on our exclusive 'members only' course carved through woods and along old logging roads, the best part about getting together with friends is the laughter.

Within minutes of arriving at our destination last Friday, we were all laughing so hard it went to the brink of six grown men crying. Have you ever had that experience where you laugh so hard you think you're going to stop breathing? Or where you laugh so hard tears start spouting from your eyes? That's a darn good laugh. It's like medicine for the mind and soul.

Unfortunately, every day life doesn't always afford the opportunities to let go with a good old fashioned belly laugh.

I had the boys rolling early on with what ended up being the line of the weekend.

Apparently, I missed a discussion about the arrival time of one of the final Clowns. So I asked, if anyone knew his ETA.

My friend Derek looked at me perplexed and informed me, "we just had this discussion Mark. Just a minute ago."

Despite the fact I was in the room, I guess my brain was somewhere else.

"I wasn't here for that," I answered.

The laughter must have roused the neighbourhood deer and bears.

"That's going to be a tough one to beat," said Derek.

While the Clown Tour is all about letting go and having fun, one of the biggest accomplishments for me was getting through fours days without smoking cigarettes.

Since quitting last January, I have not had one single break down. I had marked the Clown Tour weekend on my calendar as the big challenge. On this weekend, everyone smokes. Even my friends who don't smoke, smoke. I knew I would be surrounded by cigarette smoke but I never let it get to me.

On the drive up, my buddies said it would be OK if I broke down.

"Don't worry about it. You can quit again after the weekend."

It was like a little green nicotine devil was sitting on my shoulder, trying to lure me back with false promises.

On Monday, as we packed up, presented the 2008 Clown Tour championship trophy to the winning golfer, and closed the books on another successful boys weekend, I was already thinking about next year.

How long can we keep this up? The Clowns are all now 40 and over. Will we still be playing Frisbee golf and gathering once a year 20 years from now? Will we all still be alive?

I guess we'll just have to take it year by year. I know there would be a huge void in my life if the annual Clown Tour was ever cancelled.