Excellent Scott. Look forward to running with you again.

 

Per your suggestion above, I took the XFire Northern Route and modified it somewhat to reflect a route up thru Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge and back down to Townsend and the Foothills Parkway (see attached). MS Streets & Trips says it's about 160 miles roundtrip vs. the 150 miles for the route we ran back in the Spring. Time is approx 4 hours in either case + stops for photos & eats. I've also got driving directions, in the event we decide to run your alternate Northern route, that we can pass out at the driver's meeting Gary holds at the lodge on Friday evening.

Not to take anything away from the Biltmore trip, but for those of us that live nearby, the Biltmore typically has been seen by most of us. (Note: But there will be some great photo opportunities at Biltmore for these cars!) Jeff Cobb will have a route in & around Asheville layed out for us, but like others have stated, I'm not too thrilled about driving nearly 1.5 hours just to START a driving route. So like others, I'm more interested in driving these cars in the surrounding topography of the Smokies and stopping only occasionally when I'm hungry, need a rest and/or want to take some pictures of these cars posing in the countryside.

Something else to consider. Besides, we'd be a spectacle as a group passing thru Gatlinburg & Pigeon Forge!

FWIW

 

Sign me up for that route! First of all, I want to drive the XF up that long stretch thru the Gap, second, Gatlinburg and PF will be fun to drive thru with the top down. I'll bring at least one sweatshirt and sweater - just in case it's 60F! (You never know!)

 

Dennis,
Looking at your map, driving THROUGH Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge could be a big mistake - Lots of traffic. We usually head west at the Sugarlands Visitor center, just on the southern edge of Pigeon Forge. We go home on Monday thru Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg and traffic is bumper to bumper on Monday, I can only imagine it on Sunday.

James

 

Your feedback on traffic in & around Gatlinburg & Pigeon Forge is valuable. I really don't have a preference which route we take. This was just my interpretation of the route tom2112 originally suggested earlier in this thread.

Thanks again,

 

I have received a PM from "Crossfirejb" and she said to add her and her husband Rick to the list of members attending the Dragon.

They are #66 on the list.

Welcome Gary

 

This is going be good one ,for you that are still thinking about coming STOP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Make RES.NOW !!!!! It A great group of people to spend the weekend with , WE ALL ARE CROSSFIRE CRAZY!!!!!!!!!!!

 

my experience in Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg has always been bad...traffic is terrible...even the cops are on bicycles just to get around....but it is worth seeing if you haven't been there....allow yourself 2 hrs to get all the way thru...been there, done that several times...

 

Agreed! It's gonna be a large group. I wonder how we will fit all XF's at the dam for photos.

 

That weekend and weekend before are peak fall colors in Oct so traffic will really be bad !

 

Signed up today!! Looking soooo forward to the meet!

 

Without careful planning, we will all fit, but will take hours to get us all out. That photo of mine that I shows is two pics photoshopped together, may take 3 this fall =)

I am also looking forward to June, at least Harrahs has a big parking lot =)

 

It won't take hours to get out.
Don't worry about the parking.
We will do it in such a way that nobody is blocked in and everyone is free to pull out to the upper parking area to line up and create about 6 groups for the Saturday run.
With a little help from a few others we can do this without difficulty I'm sure.

 

Been done before, can and will be done again

 

Never been to Tenn...would at least like to breeze through....if only for a photo stop. 66 on list.....alot of Crossy's. How many were there in the spring?

 

Think there was about 48 of us in the Spring...

Deb

 

52 are in the picture:

 

kind like this better

 

That would work Osofast2 as long as we start the cars early enough in the circle to make sure as many of them are facing the rooftop direction as possible.

 

This is the way we will do it this fall !!
We will have people in place to see that each one is close to the other and use care when exiting their cars.