First the Clubs....Food report to follow…
After arriving home last Sunday afternoon from our
somewhat hectic weekend on the Eastern Shore, I didn’t even unpack my Dopp kit,
and relatively early Monday jumped in the MOMSTER again, gathered up a couple of
friends, and pointed toward "Mecca". In the world of golfers Mecca of course means
Augusta, Georgia and the Master’s tournament.
Alert readers will remember we visited it four years ago. Maybe I’ll get lucky every presidential year!
Anyway, we managed to leave early enough in the day that we arrived
at our motel (Columbia, SC) with enough time to enjoy the evening a bit (food
report to follow). FOJTE arrived after a
long journey of his own from St. Louis, and we all watched the men’s basketball
championship, and consumed some very, very,
VERY, good wines courtesy of my friends.
Being some seventy miles from the course (room availability and cost is exponential the closer to the course) we left (for me)
awfully early on Tuesday, did the sit in traffic with the usual stuff lining the road. Buyers and sellers...
Sat in more lines of traffic, eventually parking free along
with the other fans on the grounds.
And then walked (and walked, and walked, and walked some more)
with them till finally we got to the gate
Here we had our first taste of Southern Hospitality at the
tournament. All the security folks greeted us with “welcome to the
Masters!” and warning that you couldn’t bring this or that, which resulted in
several luckless fans retracing the trek back to the car to return that lawn
chair. The literature was quite explicit
in what or what not was allowed on the course.
Mercifully cell phones were among the banned items. Even the normally prepared Feeder fell afoul
of the rules. The little brochure with the tickets specifically stated
that "weapons" were not allowed on the course.
It turns out that my little Swiss Army pocket knife was considered a "weapon" so
I had to leave it at the gate. The nice
lady said “Here, I’ll put it right here (under her counter) and you pick it up
when you leave”. We’ll return to how
that played out later. I was glad I made
the tournament a safer place to be by surrendering my little one inch
knife. One does have to wonder however,
what somebody could do to you if they used some of the camera lenses I saw as a
baseball bat… now THAT is a weapon!
So finally after the long hike from the parking lot, surviving
the long walk to the gate, the lines, the crowds, you are released to the cathedral of golf
Where all of a sudden, everything just gets quieter and
calmer, people who cross in front of you (who really are not a bother) say
“excuse me”, or “thank you”; it’s what you do when in church. Once on the course, you’re pretty much free
to go wherever you wish (outside the ropes), the yellow hatted marshall’s all know who’s
where, where the nearest restrooms are, how to get to hole thirteen, and are extremely helpful and
friendly. We headed for the area of the
16th hole, the famous par three, near where the big boys were
reputedly playing. Sure enough we got
there to see some of the luminaries coming up another hole
And yes, the (media) anointed tournament favorite surveys his kingdom
One of the nice things about the practice rounds is that the
players while serious about preparing for the tournament, do have some fun.
Like on that par three sixteenth where the carry is pretty much all
water from tee to green
There is a tradition (like no other) that after they hit
their tee shots, the go down to the water’s edge and try to skip a ball across the
water, and up onto the green. The crowd chants “skip! skip! skip!” most do, some don’t
(usually garnering boo’s). There was one
group that even did it in unison. Know
who that furthest golfer is? the closest?
They play to the crowd, and everybody has a good time. Some of the caddies are hilarious. You wouldn’t see that on a tournament
round. After watching that for a while
we headed down toward “amen corner” which is anchored by “golden bell” the famous 12th
hole nestled by Raes Creek. (the green on the left is the 11th, the further one is the 12th)
You might notice the absence of the normal beauty of the
Azaleas which normally provide a backdrop for this hole. Georgia, like the rest of us experienced a
warmer than normal winter and the blooms have all gone.
The next hole is the 13th where you might
remember Mickelson hit that miracle shot from the pinestraw to a “kick-in”
eagle on his way to his last green jacket. We happened to be near the green
when he was approaching, and he walked over to that same spot.. Despite the urging of the crowd he didn’t
reattempt it and basically said:
His playing partner for the round was Freddie who seems to
be always expounding on something
By this time we were tired and footsore, but on our way out before hitting the gift shop we walked by some of the
buildings and caught a glimpse of the king himself
Kind of a fitting way to end a special day spent with son and
friends on the most famous golf course in the world with the greatest
players. Everything about it is done
right. Attendants in all the restrooms,
cleaning and straightening, and the restrooms are real buildings, not just a
line of portapotties. We’ll talk about
the food service tomorrow.
To quote a line from TV, "If you love golf, you gotta go!" It's a special place, and I'm not making that up.
and pretty much everybody is tastefully
DFG
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