It is often described as the hardest ticket in sport to secure and, after being there, it is easy to see why.
For those who do not follow golf, the Masters is one of the sport’s four major championships, held once a year in the United States.
I was fortunate enough to attend this year’s tournament, the one in which Rory McIlroy won back-to-back Masters titles, becoming just the fourth player in history to achieve the feat.
The Open, the US Open and the PGA Championship all rotate venues.
Not the Masters.
Augusta National Golf Club is its permanent home and that gives the club a rare ability to shape not just a course, but also the narrative and create a legend.
Over decades, it has done exactly that.
Every hole carries a memory.
Every corner of the property feels curated.
It is not just a golf course, it is a living story that builds year after year.
Then there are the things you do not expect.
Take the food and drink.
In a world where major events charge very high prices where you have to save a week just to afford a beer and hot chips, Augusta goes the other way.
It is almost surreal.
Sandwiches sit around $US1.50 ($NZ2.55) to $US3 and beers are between $US3 and $US5.
By modern standards, it feels like stepping back a couple of decades: prices simply have not moved much.
Even more impressive is how efficiently it all runs.
There are about five main food and beverage hubs across the course.
Each is enormous, with roughly 200 staff and six serving lines and despite queues stretching 20m-40m at times, you are through in four or five minutes.
It is organisation that borders on military precision.
The people who run this tournament should be running governments.
The merchandise, however, is a completely different story.
There are only a couple of official stores on site, but they are vast and demand is relentless.
You hear figures of up to $US100 million in sales during the week or $US1m sales per hour and standing inside one, you start to believe it.
It is shoulder to shoulder and people are buying in bulk.
While the food is incredibly cheap, the merchandise is anything but.
A standard golf shirt will set you back about $US120, before hats, pullovers or souvenirs.
Part of the appeal is exclusivity.
You can only buy it there.
People are outside the main gate at 4am waiting for the 7am gate opening to be first in line.
Getting a ticket in the first place is another story.
The ballot system is brutally selective, with about 1% of applicants successful.
I was fortunate, as a client of mine is a member and with only a handful of New Zealanders among roughly 300 members, it is a rare and lucky connection to have.
Once inside, what stands out most is how close you can get.
There are not the grandstand-heavy barriers you might expect.
At times, you are so near the players it feels like you could reach into their bag and pull out a club, not that you would.
Security is everywhere, just not overbearing.
It is controlled, but subtle.
The scale is staggering.
About 50,000 patrons attend each day, supported by more than 10,000 staff and volunteers.
And yet, it never feels chaotic.
Then there is the course itself.
Television does not quite prepare you for it.
The greens and fairways look almost artificial in their perfection.
The colour and the consistency feel almost exaggerated.
It is like the saturation has been turned up too high.
The fairways are effectively rebuilt and re-grown each year, while the greens are maintained to a standard that is hard to comprehend unless you see it in person.
What struck me just as much, though, was the contrast outside the gates.
Augusta is roughly the size of Dunedin and driving through town on the Tuesday before the tournament, it felt almost deserted.
Come evening, it fills with patrons and visitors, but during the day there is a quietness that is hard to ignore.
Just a few miles from one of the most pristine, exclusive pieces of real estate in the world, there are parts of town that feel left behind.
Two completely different worlds, side by side.
There is character, challenge and history under every step.
That, in the end, is what makes the Masters different.
It is not just the golf, the traditions or even the exclusivity.
It is the sense that everything has been carefully thought through, refined and protected.
You do not just attend the Masters, you step into something that has been built, year after year, into one of the most remarkable sporting events in the world.
• Hamish Walker is a former National MP and director-salesman of Walker & Co Realty, Queenstown.
