Since I’m low on ideas for prattlings this week I thought I’d skate along by reprising a post from an old blog about the last time we took a really-truly vacation. That was 2011, when Marie and I went on our NASCAR pilgrimage to Charlotte Motor Speedway. This has been an annual trip for many years, but this year we added a twist.
Normally we just take a long weekend and pop over to North Carolina and back. While there we take in a race, visit some race shops and see some sights. We live just 12 miles from the Tennessee/North Carolina border and the drive to Salisbury (where we stay with relatives) is only about 3 hours – if we drive straight through, which we rarely do.
This time we decided to go to North Carolina by way of Alabama and Georgia so we could visit with my twin-brother-by-another-mother and his wife. We took an entire week (an historic event in itself), took our time and enjoyed the journey.
Roads Less Traveled
To us, getting there is half the fun, so we tend to avoid interstate travel whenever possible and make use of state highways; there is so much more to see and experience this way. I am often reminded of the scene in the animated movie “Cars” where Lightning McQueen and his Porche girlfriend have taken an exciting drive along the old Route 66, ending up on a high overlook. Below, the new Interstate highway slashes across the landscape and hundreds of cars whiz along it. McQueen observes, “Look at them; they’re missing all of this. They’re just missing it!” How true! Interstates are great if your primary objective it to get where you are going ASAP, but if you want to enjoy the trip, get off the Big I and use the smaller highways.
Der Beetle Bug
Our pick-up truck is great for getting us around locally, but it has developed some idiosyncrasies that make it not the best choice for long road trips. So when we go on these extended drives, we rent a compact car from Enterprise. When we arrived at their local office the day before our departure, all they had for us was this sunflower yellow Volkswagen Beetle. We were leery of this, but it was all they had ready to go out. What could we do – Enterprise is the only game in town for car rentals.
However, other than the trunk being rather small, we had no problems with this and it turned out to be a surprisingly good choice for a road trip. The seats were comfortable. It had a surprising amount of interior space – even in the back seat it had good leg room; something we discovered when we went touring with Aunt Ruth and Marie sat in the back. The ride was good; not like a luxury car, but who would expect that? It handled well; the rack and pinion steering was tight and responsive. Perhaps a little too responsive for some; just a small twist on the steering wheel and the car is going in a new direction. That is typical of rack & pinion, and it may take some who are used to gearbox steering by surprise; it means you have to pay attention to your driving and not be gawking or overly involved in talking to passengers in the car. The brakes were quite touchy too. I have enjoyed driving a number of sports cars, so none of this was new to me.
My first impression of the car as I slid into it was a memory of the old AMC Pacer; that car shared the “driving a fish bowl” sensation created by large windows and lots of glass. It was odd at first, but turned out to be a blessing because of the excellent views it offered as we traveled.
Our only real complaint with the Beetle was that the placement of the cup holders was terrible; they were UNDER a flip-down arm rest. If the arm rest was in use, both driver and passenger had to be contortionists to reach their drink. Access was good with the arm rest up, but on long drives I like having arm rest on both sides while I drive. But in the grand scheme of things, this is a minor complaint.
Marie figured our operating cost on this car was about eight cents per mile, which is pretty good.
When we go on road trips, I drive, Marie navigates. Marie is an excellent navigator and finds all manner of interesting routes for us to use — and we always end up where we intended to end up. Eventually. We make a good team.
The High Points
I’ll spare you a blow-by-blow account of the trip, which was mostly enjoying some time visiting with folks we’ve been missing for too long. But there were a few things worth noting.
Road Music
The first was Highway 77 in Northern Alabama. In Tennessee we enjoy some of the best roadways available in the nation and we are sometimes surprised that other states allow their roads to deteriorate like they do. This one was one such, but in an amusing way.
It is a concrete highway, so it has expansion cracks cut across it at regular intervals and filled with tar. Other cracks are also filled in this manner. The result is that as you drive along the road you get a bumpety-bump; bumpety-bump; bumpety-bump rhythm from the expansion joints, an intermittent bump from the odd cracks and the occasional Bang from places where the road slab raised up a bit. Add to that the rough spots in the concrete that add a voom-va-voom sound as the tires rumple over them and I was laughing out loud because our trip along this road sounded for all the world like a performance of Stomp! (See what I mean)
Historic Bridge
Marie and I have always liked covered bridges, and Opelika Alabama offers one that had been saved from destruction by moving it 25 miles to a park and restored. It even uses wooden pegs in the beam joints instead of bolts. It is a wonderful piece of engineering and a delight to look at.
Confusing the Clerk
As we were leaving Alabama we stopped for gas. The clerk asked us where we were from; Marie told him “Newport Tennessee”. He asked where that was and we told him. He then asked where we were going, Marie told him “Salisbury, North Carolina” and he gave her the strangest look as he traced that journey out on the map in his mind. I could see he was having trouble with it so I offered, “We’re taking the scenic route.”
“I guess so!” he replied, “about 300 miles scenic.” Marie explained the situation to him, but just watching the initial confusion on his face was one of those “priceless” moments.
Managed Forests
As we traveled through eastern Alabama and western Georgia I noticed a lot of managed pine forests (and many log trucks hauling logs to the mill). These are easy to spot because of their differences from virgin forests. First these forests contain only pine trees, no hardwoods. The trees are spaced evenly, and the brush and undergrowth that normally covers a forest floor has been removed. All the lower branches are removed, leaving tall (100 feet or more in a mature stand of trees) straight, smooth trunks with just a pom-pom of needles at the top of each tree. I live in a virgin forest, I know what that looks like; this was fascinatingly different.
I was not able to get a photo of my own because there were no shoulders on this highway, we always had traffic behind us, and good glimpses into these forests came up so suddenly Marie was not able to get the camera booted up in time to catch it. But, except for the white stuff growing on the trunks, this looks just like the ones we saw.
Want to see how they harvest these trees? Watch this: puts Paul Bunyan to all manner of shame!
Billy Graham Library
While in North Carolina we visited the Billy Graham Library. This is an impressive and informative display that is a unique combination of museum and mission. The large barn-shaped building houses an interactive tour of the life and times of Mr. William Franklin Graham, how he got into ministry, key events and people along the way, and the impact he has had on our world. All of this is done in an entertaining manner, beginning with a talking cow that tells about ‘Billy Frank’s upbringing on his parent’s dairy farm. This was one of the more impressive displays of robotics that I have seen. For lunch we stopped in the cafeteria after the tour and had “Billy Franks” (large all-beef wieners) that were truly a meal in themselves. There is an excellent bookstore, and the Graham family home is open for tours. And it’s all free admission. For more information or directions see the Library Web Site.
Gone NASCAR Racin
Of course the main purpose of this pilgrimage was to take in a live NASCAR race. We used to attend the All-Star race (used to be known as The Winston) because this is a special race where the best of the best race for a huge purse and major bragging rights, not points. Because no points are awarded, the race teams can push it to the max without risking messing up their season. There is also a special format designed to make the race more fun to watch, this format injects even more competition and puts even more of that on the pit crews than normal. In short, it’s just a racer’s race.
But, over the years, the NASCAR crowds have changed. Not only was the cigarette smoke getting worse and worse (even an open-air venue can get oppressive to non-smokers when you’ve got 100,000 other fans chain smoking.) but people seemed more interested in getting fall-down drunk on $4.00 a glass beer than in watching the race. So we switched to watching the All-Star on TV and attending the Craftsman Truck Race instead. The crowds for this are smaller and more interested in the race than the party. The photo above was taken by the track photographer working the stands during pre-race activities. This was the first time we ended up in the Charlotte Motor Speedway’s photo album. I’m the one with the track logo sticking out of my head.
Winding Down
Woven in among all this was a lot of good food and great fellowship with friends and family that we don’t get to see often enough. We came home in time that I would be able to teach my Sunday School class and we’d a have a day to get settled back in before returning to work. It was a great trip, we enjoyed it very much and yet it’s nice to be back home.
Marie commented on the fact that when we lived in St Louis and took frequent vacations, we’d come up over a hill, the city would spread out before us and we’d think “Ugh… lets just go back where we were.” One time, we did; and here we are. This was a great trip, but it’s nice to have no qualms about being back home and getting into our normal lives again. My thanks to Mike & Carmen and Jim & Ruth for all their hospitality. It was great fun!
