The Masters ...

The Masters ... what a trip

First, the schedule ... we watched Thursday morning, all Saturday, and all Sunday. While we weren't watching the golf, we were playing 5 rounds, and staying out until 3 in the morning having a blast.

Thursday highlights:
The first thing we did was visit the golf shop to donate to the local economy, let's just say it wasn't cheap, but in all honesty, it wasn't as ridiculous as it could have been. We saw the first hole of Arnold Palmer's 50th and last appearance at the Masters. He got a par on the first hole, really cool to see. There was a brief tour of some of the front 9 on the course, then it was off to play golf.

Saturday highlights:
This was the day where we basically walked the course from the 1st hole to the 18th hole. As we walked around the course, we were kind of following Riley, Romero, and Faxon (can't remember the other guy). We did get to see
Tiger Woods as well as Phil Mickelson. It was a bit tiring, and by the
end, we were all pooped - which didn't stop us from going out that night.
We talked about our favorite holes on the course, and I just couldn't pick.
I do think that I like the back nine holes better than the front nine holes, but again, they are all magnificent.

Sunday highlights:
We chose to set up camp on the 15th hole in the grandstands. If you were watching and you saw a shot of the "stone bridge" to the left of the green/pond as you approach the 15th hole, we were just above that. This gave us a view of the golfers coming into the 15th green, as well as the 16th green. In order to secure this position, we got to the Masters shortly before 8am (when the gates open) and made a beeline for the grandstands. It wasn't until around 1:30-1:45 until the first golfers made it around ...
well worth the wait! While we were waiting for the golfers, they had a scoreboard where the leader's scores are posted and the anticipation and reaction from the gallery as the scores were posted was simply electric - ooh, ahh, oh!. As the leaders started teeing off we began to hear more and more of the loud cheers coming from all over the course. Each time we heard one, we would all speculate on who it was, and what it was, then the score would be posted and we had our own reactions. We watched every golfer that made the cut come thru the 15th and 16th which was quite a treat. The best of the best on stage for what can be said is the most storied golf course in the world. We saw 2 hole-in-ones on the 16th green from Harrington and Triplett, a few eagles on the 15th hole, and loads of birdies on both.
There was no birdie bigger that we saw than Phil Mickelson's as he's chasing Ernie Els on the back nine of the course. We had just watched Ernie Els birdie 15 to go 8 under par to take a one stroke lead on Mickelson. As Mickelson is approaching 15, Els is teeing off on 16. Phil pars 15, Els pars 16. (Remember, we just saw -2- hole in one's so the crowd is just freaking out). Mickelson steps up to the 16 tee and hits to almost the identical location that both of the hole in ones hit. His ball didn't quite roll the same way due to the spin, but he stepped up and hit the put for a birdie and a tie with Els at 8 under. The gallery was exploding on each put, and everyone was pulling for Mickelson. After they passed the 16th, we hustled to the 10th hole in anticipation of a playoff since they were tied at 8 under (why didn't we go to the 18th? It was a mob scene) As Mickelson came up on 18, we had a camera man from CBS doing his best to provide details. We heard that Phil's second shot was on the green, slightly above the hole. Mickelson's pairing Chris DiMarco putted out so up steps Phil.
At this point, all conversation on the 10th green stopped. Dead silence.
All you could hear are the birds chirping. The camera man says the put is away and is holding 2 fingers out to show it's still traveling. Still silence. Then all of a sudden, the camera man's fingers drop, he says "It's in!" and the sound from the 18th green is just getting to us and we're cheering as well!!! We "ran" up the 10th hole, which is all uphill, to see the jacket ceremony. We didn't get to see much of the ceremony, but as Mickelson was walking in through a corridor of fans, two of our group was in the front row and as he passed on the way in, we were chanting "ASU".

What a finish to a totally amazing trip.