While on vacation, I ventured out from my normal golf club and drove over to Flower Mound and played the Tour 18. Tour 18 is America’s Greatest Golf Holes. I took my camera along to document a few of the holes.
The Blue Monster from Doral.
Crooked Sticks #15
Wing Foot #10 Par 3, 174 yards, I hit the green and made par.
TPC Sawgrass #17. I hit the green and 3 putted for Bogey. I played a knocked down 9 iron from 127 into a strong wind. The Start of Amen Corner: #11 from Augusta National
#12 from Augusta National, 148 yards, I hit the green on the fly, one hopped into the back bunker. Hit a decent sand shot that stayed on the green and 2 putted for Bogey. The REAL #12 from my trip to the Masters.
#13 from Augusta National
The REAL #13
I was supposed to play with a couple of guys from my normal group. They all backed out and got paired with 3 three Farmers Branch Police Department Officers. Really nice guys. This was before all the craziness but I offered to take their photo on TPC 17 tee box. Thanks for your service guys!
The course was in decent shape. The bunkers were washed out from some heavy rains the two days before. The mid-week rate was only $39 and I thought it was a fun track and a good value. I will go back now that I have played a lot of the blind tee shots.
I was on vacation the week of Fourth of July. The plan was golf all 10 days in the morning and staycation at home in the pool in the afternoon. After 6 straight days of Golf I decided to take Sharon to Austin for the three B’s. Bats, BBQ, and Blues.
We left Friday morning at 6:00 AM to get to Franklin’s BBQ before they opened 11:00. We got there 9:50 AM. The line started forming at 5:30 AM, and 4 people in front of us was a guy holding the “Last Man Standing” sign. He was the last person to be guaranteed Brisket. Pretty soon a worker came out and told us the same things and that from our place in line would be 4 to 5 hour wait and may not get any Brisket. We left and went to Black’s BBQ down in Lockhart. I had the brisket and turkey and was not impressed with their meats, but they had GREAT sides. Hutchins BBQ in McKinney is better.
Sharon isn’t a big meat eater so I treated her to her favorite Italian. We ate at Botticelli’s South Congress. Then we went to the Continental Club for some live Texas Blues.
I really enjoyed Sam the Soulman. Here is a little IPhone video.
Then walked about a mile down to Congress Street Bridge to watch over 3 million bats take flight to go eat over 10,000 lbs of insects every night. The Bats are Mexican free-tailed. Really special to see. They started flying at 8:42 right at dusk and not idea for photography.
The Bats viewing would be way better from the water on one of the tour boats. The iPhone video actually did a pretty good job capturing the feeling of the bats.
Saturday lunch we headed to The Salt Lick another famous BBQ joint. Their meats were better than Black’s but their sides were not good at all. The highlight of the meal was their homemade bread and the cobbler and ice cream for dessert. Still NOT Hutchins BBQ.
Spend the afternoon hanging out with Jen, Jared, and Eden our old neighbors from Bloomington. Then headed to the find the bats of Round Rock. You could get much closer and they few with a fair amount of good light left. around 8:25.
Stopped by Antone’s Austin famous Blues club on the way back to the hotel but didn’t stay long.
Sunday morning we hit the famous VooDoo Doughnuts on the way out of town! Way better than either BBQ joint.
I still plan on trying Franklins one more time. Maybe Aaron Franklin will invite me to do a food blog on him. Only one person every was allowed to cut in line and that was President Obama. He bought and paid for everybodies food that was in line. I am guessing our tax dollars paid but that is a different post.
Austin is a weird city and we will be back. We packed a lot in during our 2 and half days.
Not my normal blog post full of wildlife and nature but it was what flew in front of my lens while on vacation.
The Start of Amen Corner: #11 from Augusta National 
The REAL #12 from my trip to the Masters.
