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If by March it looks like I’ll be able to get there in May, I’ll definitely commit. How likely is that? 
I think things in Europe will be normalising by May but I don’t know about the US.
Fuck knows what will happen but hopefully I’ll have had the vaccine by then anyway and won’t have to hide for a week when I arrive. Though I’ll probably go to Coeur d’Alene first then drive over from there.
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Emotional support animal standards. I have a terrible fear of flying (as well as the rest of the anxiety issues) and really only manage if I’m high or have my dog, and I prefer the dog. Shouldn’t be too much of a problem so fingers crossed.
The whole purpose of us having the celebration on the east coast is it is in the middle of our families, PNW and U.K., plus there’s no need to rush it since we’ve been married since 2017 anyway!
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We will toast to your wedding when you are here in May! (You’re still picking up the open bar tab, right?)
Thanks for sharing about the fear of flying. I didn’t fly for about 3 years due to a fear of flying too, I can empathize with how horrible / debilitating that can be.
Is your dog also a golf dog? Would be great to see more good dogs on the course (probably another thread).
Yes, Local Boys Taproom in Gig Harbor would be more than happy to have y’all for after round drinks. About 20 minutes from the Hotel Murano and we have a giant outdoor patio with over 400 different beers from Washington State.
No idea why this uploaded upside down.
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Dang - I was hoping this was some Alice in Wonderland upside down theme going on.
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I thought I was looking at some weird modern art thing.
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@lazyjk @LukeBoatright nah, just the privilege us non-nesters get. Shaming us into submission.
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I’m hoping to be there! Signed up in the sheet. Chambers bay - one of my favorite courses in the world.
Thanks for organizing.
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I’m mega committed now. Flights are booked.
Going to be in early Thursday and out early Monday.
Super excited for this.
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Spoken to my family and got a 
to come stay and borrow a car. First hurdle. Just need Covid to behave now…
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Love the 7th hole. Hope you had a good time.
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A man deep in thought
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Also taking a photo actually haha
@ausbab with this sweet picture from Chambers today
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Can you tell me anything about that tree? Looks cool.
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2022 PGA venue?!?!
I’d love to see Chambers get another crack at it.
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…You’re standing as close as you can to the only tree at Chambers Bay. It’s known as the Lone Fir.
The tree that people keep trying to kill.
Seven years ago, someone apparently rode a jet ski across the Sound under the cloak of darkness, hiked up to the tree – a Douglas fir less than 75 years old – and, in between consuming several bottles of beer and smoking a few cigarettes, started whacking away with a hatchet. When the culprit was done, an eight-inch deep gash left the tree on its last limbs.
Arborists were consulted. Some experts suggested the tree couldn’t be saved. Residents volunteered their own firs as replacements. But a treatment eventually was devised, with epoxy inserted into the gap and iron bars attached vertically along the wound, acting as heavyweight stitches. The tree survived.
It wasn’t the first time somebody wanted the tree dead.
When Chambers Bay course architect Robert Trent Jones Jr. first began working on the course more than a decade ago, he had a conversation with David Pepper, then head of the R&A championship committee. More important, at least in the context of this conversation, Pepper was a links purist.
Jones told Pepper about the venue he was working on, that it would be a true links course, and that it would be spectacular. He mentioned the fescue grass. Excellent. He mentioned the sandy landscape. Perfect. Then he mentioned the Lone Fir.
Pepper shook his head.
“Bobby, one tree?” he asked. “One tree too many.”
But Jones had his marching orders from Pierce County Executive John Ladenburg, who spearheaded the Chambers Bay project. Ladenburg had given Jones wide latitude to create the course but said the tree must remain.
Otherwise, “they’ll impeach me,” Ladenburg told Jones. “We’re in the Pacific Northwest and we have tree huggers here, so the tree stays.”
And so it did.
Now it’s become a symbol of the property. Much like the Lone Cypress at Pebble Beach, the Lone Fir is used for marketing purposes and logo apparel. It can be seen on the official 2015 U.S. Open poster. Polo created a golf shirt with a photo of the Lone Fir. You can buy it at the merchandise tent this week for $86. Wear at your own fashion risk.
Fans this week have journeyed to that part of the course to take photos of the tree. One local resident said his tree photo as the wallpaper on his smartphone. One of the marshals working the 16th tee said people have asked him why there’s only one tree on the course. He doesn’t have an answer.
“Because the guy who built the course wanted just one tree?” he said. “I don’t really know.”
The Lone Fir will offer a brief respite from the sun when players reach the 16th tee, but officially will not impact play. Not every player knew that prior to this week, which is why Michael Putnam – who lives in University Place and was the first golfer to ever play at Chambers Bay – has taken the role as Lone Fir educator.
“Some of those guys knew that there was only one tree on the golf course,” Putnam said. “They thought maybe it was in the middle of the fairway somewhere. They thought it came into play somewhere.”
A logical assumption, given that golf’s most famous tree – Augusta National’s Eisenhower Tree – was in play at the 17th hole until it was fatally damaged during an ice storm in early 2014. The Eisenhower Tree was mourned and bid a hero’s farewell; in fact, a slice of the tree can be found in an historical display at the Masters media center.
Even before anyone imagined a golf course being built at Chambers Bay, it’s amazing the Lone Fir survived. After all, the site is a formal sand and gravel mine, and also has been used as a paper and lumber mill. The only trees on the property were the ones coming in via rail.
Yet, because the Lone Fir was out of the way and not bothering anybody – it stands on a raised embankment on the course boundary – it was spared. Or perhaps it just wasn’t important enough for anybody (except a drunken vandal on a jet ski) to spend time chopping it down.
Maybe people just figured the elements would take care of the tree. After all, it’s never been a particularly big tree, especially for its age, and its health was iffy back then. USGA executive director Mike Davis told the New York Times that “it kind of had a Charlie Brown Christmas tree look” when he first saw it in 2004.
That’s not a compliment.
Given that there was nothing to shield from whatever Mother Nature threw at it from the Puget Sound, perhaps just letting it die naturally would be best for all concerned. Certainly, everybody’s conscience would be spared.
All that raced through Jones’ mind on a chilly February in 2004. Big bulldozers were moving sand, and as he walked around the site, he saw the lone tree, a small piece of green against an otherwise brown backdrop.
It struck him why Ladenburg and the Tacoma locals were so adamant it remain on the property.
“That tree has been a witness to everything that’s gone on here,” he said. “Somehow it survived the miners. It was struggling all of its life. Then it survived basically us.”
Now it’s a source of pride, an environmentally correct symbol, and a point of interest for curiosity seekers.
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No chance. Chambers Bay is still “partnered” with the USGA. The Four-ball this year is a test run of the new poa greens to see if they can pass a USGA stress test. If they do, I fully expect a US Open or US Women’s Open to announced after that.
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