SELOC at our 6th annual Slay the Dragon Run (more than Lexus inside)
Here is our official write-up by DaveGS4, who led the effort!!
Dave's brief Dragon 2007 Debrief
Charlotte Caravan to the Dragon
The trip started with a 20 mile detour off our route for the folks in the Charlotte caravan. I thought the museum was very well done and had some of the best preserved and hottest M Coupe and E30 M3 racecars I've ever seen, along with some very historical and unique BMW vehicles and motorcycles. I'm definitely going back and hitting it up again when I have more time and doing the factory tour.
A M Coupe and E30 M3 at the BMW Factory Museum
Since our Charlotte group looked like we were going to arrive about 8pm, we chose to stop along the way at an Arby's for a quick bite and noticed an ABC (liqour) store next door while we were eating. Jeff found a $100 bottle of reserve tequilla that he had been searching for (comes in a special wooden box) which was mostly consumed once we arrived safely at the hotel. Friday night we started meet check in in the hotel conference room, hung out and watched some prior year Dragon videos. The folks who drove in from OH through the Dragon reported that there were ten police officers on the 11 miles as they passed through on the way to the hotel.
Saturday - the Main Event
Some folks got up and washed their cars, knowing there would be a bunch of pictures taken. The full group met in the hotel conference room and we started the morning with a safety review and a frank 'how can we keep from getting a ticket' with the significantly enhanced police presence on the TN part of the Dragon this year. We had a few prizes to give away thanks to Steve Ganz at L-tunedparts / Carson Toyota , Jeff (Porsche GT3) who provided an awesome framed picture he took himself of a Lemans car and Mark (ColumbusIS) who donated a set of Top Gear DVDs.
We drove our 'warm up' straight to the Tapoco Lodge where we had lunch and took pictures in the parking lot. Lunch was good, but slow... "don't forget the steak fries" - a core competency of the Lodge, along with the huge club sandwiches and great iced tea. The day was starting to get very hot and topped above 100 degrees in the lot... once we got up to the top of the mountain it cooled down a full 10 degrees though.
Leaving the Tapoco
We went to the base of the Fontana Dam from lunch and looked at this cool man-made monument. It's a Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) damn built in the 50's and part of it was used in the movie "the Fugitive" where Harrison Ford jumps out of a spillpipe into a river below. Those pipes are all over the place in the mountains in the area. The top of the dam is very interesting as well - unfortunately once we arrived there (a 15 minute drive from the bottom) we found the road to the visitors center was torn up and extremely dusty and the visitor's center was closed. So much for our nicely polished rides!.
At the base of the dam, and arriving at the top to find it in ruins
From the dam we had a brief stop at the Dragon motorcycle lodge and gift shop where the 'tree of shame' holds pieces of all the motorcycles that have been wrecked on the road that year. We took off on the Dragon in two groups (fast group and everyone else) but it didn't matter... as soon as we hit the TN border we started seeing cops every couple of minutes. Slow traffic and the speed limit set at 35mph kept the drive pretty dull, although it did allow for a nice windows down, Prodigy (my annual Dragon theme music) blasting session through the Mark Levinson setup in the LS430 for me.
We gathered beside the lake at the end of the run and I was pretty depressed at our events of the day so far with the unpaved road / closed dam center / speed-limit traffic-ridden Dragon drive.... But the next part of our 100 mile or so loop in the mountainous area was MUCH better. Some nice long straightaways where several folks tested their speed limitersand great mountain roads with scenic overlooks. It was good to let our cars and minds stretch their legs after being cooped up all morning. We had a couple of missed turns and our group broke up and rejoined a few times, but everyone made it back to the hotel safely.
View from one of the Cherohala Skyway overlooks, taking a break
For dinner we ordered pizza and wings and everyone brought down their beverages... we watched some of the day's video but somehow we didn't have the right cable for most of the cameras there. Five of us played a No Limit hold'em poker tournament (Larry - Vu's co-driver - won) and others just hung out and talked about cars and life. This is what these meets are all about. Thanks to those folks who helped clean up as well - made it much nicer )and faster) with all the pitching in when we were done.
Sunday - Another chance to Tame the Dragon
Sunday morning at 8am a smaller group went to drive the Dragon again... we had a scout (me) go ahead of the group looking for police cars and set up to take photos. There were none that I saw and eventually stopped to setup for pictures. Several groups of bikes, BMW E30s and S2000's came flying past so I was hopeful our folks could get a good run in. Unfortunatley my first location was too shady so all the pictures I got were cool blurs... Their return trip was better as I picked a sunny location. All in all, a much more satisfying drive for those who went than the one on Saturday.
VVT-I and 1sicklex tearing it up
We stopped again at the Dragon Motorcycle Lodge and spoke briefly to the E30 and S2Ki groups. I also pulled off a couple of times on the way back to the hotel to take some pictures of just one of the streams and lakes we drive by on this trip... there are literally hundreds in this area and we don't appreciate them enough and see them only as a blur when we're driving past.
We packed our cars and several stopped for some decent BBQ nearby before heading home to our respective cities.
Thanks for all who came and made this another fun event, even if the main part of the drive sucked this year due to all the law enforcement attention.
Attendees:
Porsche 911 (996 GT3 and 996 Carrera)
BMW E46 M3
Lotus Elise
Honda S2000 (two)
Lexus IS300 (two)
Lexus IS350 (two)
Lexus GS300
Lexus GS430 (two)
Lexus LS430
Toyota Supra TT
Audi S4 Avant
Infiniti G35 (two)
The rest of my pictures are posted HERE.
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Originally Posted by 1SICKLEX
