Spying on Pinehurst

[ILMgolfnut]

I was working in Greensboro, NC, yesterday morning, left there about noon. There are about three ways to drive back to my house from Greensboro; all are about the same distance/time, and I go back and forth between them to reduce the boredom. Yesterday, on a beautiful sunny afternoon, I decided to take a slight detour from one of those routes to check out Pinehurst. I had been to Southern Pines before, but never got onto the grounds at Pinehurst, so I corrected that.

The first thing I wondered is if, since the town of Pinehurst basically exists because of golf, I would get the same vibe driving into the resort as I did the first time I drove into St. Andrews in October. The answer was no. There is nothing I've experienced quite like making the turn and seeing the R&A, the monument and then the 1st tee and 18th green of the Old Course, and probably won't be until/if I ever get to drive up Magnolia Lane in Augusta, or maybe 17 Mile Drive to Pebble Beach.

Second is you can definitely tell that the U.S. Open is coming. From the sign at the county line "Moore County -- Home of the U.S. Open Golf Championship" to the street banners welcoming the Open, and definitely all the construction going on once you get into the resort.

For a Thursday afternoon in January, I thought the place was pretty busy. Number 2 was closed (more on that later) but the other courses I could see were open (some of the Pinehurst courses are actually several miles away and I didn't go check them out) and the parking lot was fairly full. And the construction work was everywhere.

Once you park, the Pinehurst Country Club clubhouse is right there, and seven of the courses are very close by (#2 starts right by the clubhouse, The Cradle and Thistle Dhu are right there too, #1, #3, #4 and #5 begin a few hundred yards away). I would love to play #1 some day, and The Cradle sounds like a blast (it's a 9-hole par-3 track, takes a little over an hour to play, and has a very relaxed vibe, much different than the other courses). Thistle Dhu is a wildly contoured putting course similar to what I saw at the Himalayas at St. Andrews and would probably be a blast as well. But #2 was the reason for the detour. Had to check out the first tee, and the 18th green, and the Payne Stewart statue behind that green. There are also other statues, including one of Donald Ross, the Dornoch native who designed several of the courses, including #2. I'll have to see at some point if #1 and #2 remind me of what I saw in Dornoch; my guess is they will. 

Below is the Payne statue, the 18th green where he made that putt, and the view down the 1st fairway. Hoped I'd get to see somebody playing 1, putting out on 18, etc., but I'm imagining the game's best doing just that in five months, just as I envisioned Tiger and Jack and John Daly (my fellow Hog) lifting the claret jug on the 18th green at the Old Course.

 

Edited January 12 by ILMgolfnut

[cksurfdude]

Nice mini travelogue .. fun read!