By: Hib Halverson
The "Return to the Road" was a cross-country caravan of Corvette
Convertibles organized by Chevrolet. It started in Chicago on 9/9 and
ended in Ontario, California. As much as possible, it was run
on historic US66.
I knew my trip to join the "Return to the Road" was going to not
just be another magazine trip before I even got there. I caught an
America West flight out of Ontario that would eventually put me in
Flagstaff AZ were the last leg of this two-week, Corvette extravaganza would
start. Actually, it was "flights" because I took a real jet to Phoenix
then changed to one of those little Beech 1900 commuter jobs for the
40-min run up to Flag. I knew things would get interesting when the
commuter flight was delayed "due to bad weather". It finally left PHX and
I promptly fell asleep only to wake up as we hit turbulence near
Flagstaff. Sitting in the front row, I could look out the windshield and
see a big-assed Thunderhead. All of a sudden the pilot banked, dropped
the gear and flaps and began to descend at 2000 feet a minute. Soon we
turned final (stil going down at 1000 ft/min) and after we landed I
looked out northeast to see that big thunderbumper and lots of rain.
Guess we got in just in time.
Next stop, the Little America Lodge in Flag for an overnight. And, of
course, after dinner, the first major happening on my segment of the
Return to the Road was to party!! Off a group of us went, headed by my
old buddy Larry Jansen (Goodyear's Resident Engineer for Corvette) and some
Chevy folks to a bar called the "Museum Club" which, I come to learn, in
additon to being known by locals as "The Zoo" and being an historic Route
66 landmark, is probably the hottest country-western club in northwestern
AZ. Yep, you read it right, Hib Halverson,
Mr.-Alternative-music-give-me-No-Doubt-or-die, set foot in a CW bar and
hung out with cowboys and listened to Garth Brooks (gack). This gets
better...
After many bottles of Pete's Wicked Ale, I even got talked into learning
this "Texas Two-Step" thing. Talk about strange happenstance. A nice
young lady, Mariana Oyanguren, a reporter for a huge, Spanish-language TV
network that is covering Return to the Road, volunteered to try and teach
me to two step and...she was reasonably sucssful. Well, I have that
Pete's Wicked dude to blame for all that. The band playing the place was
called "RodeoX" and, while their first three sets were very ordinary
country-western fare, the situation degenerated seriously during the last
set. They covered two Kiss songs then played the theme from the old TV
show, The Jeffersons. Time to leave. We called a cab.
Next morning bright and early (go figure, after sucking up beers until 1
a.m.) had me out in the parking lot of the Lodge looking at 20 brand new
'98 Convertibles, 18 automatics and 2 manuals...you know what car I put
my stuff in, ok. Colors were, of course, red, white and blue in early
morning light. Talk about a photo op. I loaded up the Nikon F5 and began
to fire away. Soon after, Shows and Shoots, a top-notch fleet maintenance
operation out of Michign, passed out the keys and I tossed my stuff
(including, thankfully, some good alternative CDs) into a nice, blue,
six-speed.
At 8 a.m. we were on the Road headed for Kingman AZ, first on I-40 and
then, via Seligman on Historic 66. Man, what a beautiful morning! Clear,
blue sky, a few puffy clouds, empty road and a Corvette. Of course, with 20
cars and a wide variety of driving skills, this was not a typical media ride. Mainly it was 10 over the limit and lots of watching
countryside go by. My car was 19th in the 20 so I had great views of the
two-mile long caravan as it cut though the curving roads between Seligman
and Kingman. The top-down Corvette just purred along. I had Paula Cole and Beth
Ortin in the CD. The daydreaming even got to a point that I was thinking
how I could afford one of these cars.
Opps, reality check.
Smokey Bear spotted.
We were at city limits of Kingman and we picked up a police escort into
town. We were headed for the local Chevy dealer who had lunch and a 2 hr
afternoon event to showcase the 20 cars. The trip into Kingman was kinda
cool because there was a guy in one of the cars from the local FM station
what was live on the air describing our entry into town.
After burgers, chips and lotsa bottled water (to continue the rehydrating
process after last nights wild party) we sat around talking to the local
Corvette enthusiasts and listening to a live band do country and 50s rock
tunes. A little after 2 p.m. it was finally time to head out on the
second leg of the day's trip.
By the time we left Kingman, it was well over 100 degrees and in spite
of being labeled a wuss, I put the top up, turned on the a/c and popped
in another CD. We headed southwest out of Kingman, again, on historic 66
which takes us into the hills via some great windy roads, (too bad the
group was so big and structured because I woulda liked to get the hammer
down) up to the old mining town of Oatman. This town was definitely an
1800s type of place. Very rustic, trouristy and known for a large herd of
wild burros that lives in the town itself. The sight of 20 Corvettes rolling
slowly through the main street, amongst all these burros was, to the say
the least, memorable.
After the adventure in Oatman, it was a winding drive, down out of the
mountains and along the Arizona side of the Colorado River and onto I-40,
again. Soon we were in that desert garden-spot, Needles, Calfornia. More
often than not during the summer either Needles or Blythe California
record some of the hottest temps for cities in the US. Today, seemed no
different. At 5:30 pm, we arrived at the Needles city limits and 107
degrees was showing in the display of the Corvettes HVAC. Everyone but me was top
down. Hey, let them toast and give me a/c!!
Once again we got a police escort, this time the San Bernardino County,
Sheriff, to Jack Smith Park in Needles. This is where the Needles Chamber
of Commerce and the local Chevy dealer had set up a big, BBQ for the 50
or so people on the Return to the Road, the local Corvette Club and
whomever else showed up. There was a live band, BBQ beef, beans and plenty
of cold beer...though after last night's antics, I stuck to Coke. No way
was I going to let myself degenerate into two-stepping, agin. At near
nine pm the party was over and it was back into the blue Corvette headed for,
ah..."downtown" Needles CA for an overnight at a motel. Again we had
escort from the Sherriff. Hard workin' guys, this local law enforcement.
It is events like this that always reinforce in my mind that the Corvette
is America's greatest automotive icon. In all four towns we drove in
today, Flagstaff, Seligman, Kingman and Needles people pulled over in
their cars to watch and wave, sat on their front steps and in some cases
lined the streets to see all these Corvettes pass by. Kids waved, adults
waved...everyone loves the Corvette. Everywhere we stopped, I spent half
the time answering questions, showing off the LS1 engine, letting people
in the car and, generally, selling America's Sports Car. Chevy has done a
pretty cool thing with this Return to the Road.
In closing, a bit about the car itself. There has been a lot lately
about Corvette problems. Let me say that this car I drove was much
better than any of the Corvettes I have driven previously which were: pilot
coupes in late 96, an early production coupe last March and early
production Convertibles in June. The fuel pump could not be heard unless
I got out, put the seat back forward and listened. The improvement to the
shifter for 98 makes it rattle-free and even slicker to shift. Even the
F45, which this car has, seemed a bit more firm. I understand that the
controller had been reprogrammed for 98. While, I still prefer Z51 over
the very soft base and F45 suspensions, for the driving we did today, F45
was acceptable.
About the only thing I can complain about is this car had
a little fit problem at the left rear corner of the hood and...I still
hate those cheesy four exhaust pipes. It was clear to me that the Corvettes
cooling system is somewhat better than C4 because in 100-110 ambient
temps, with the air on and some pretty long idle times during impromptu
caravan stops, I never say the temp get over 220 and usually is held at
205-210. Once I got rolling it was down to 185-190. It would be hard to
do that with a C4. I tell you, I wish I was rich and had a three car
garage, a Z51 Corvette would be mine tomorrow.
The highpoint of the event was Saturday night's arrival at the Route 66
Rendezvous in San Bernardino Calif. The Rendezvous is a weekend-long car
show/celebration event aimed at muscle cars, street rods, Corvettes and
all kinds of other street hi-po and show cars. In fact, it has a bit of
everything with wheels other than minitrucks and lowriders.
The Rendezvous is a wildly sucessful event that takes place with full
support of the city and chamber of commerce and is staged in the downtown
area of San Bernardino. Saturday night is always the climax of the show
and includes, a rarity these days, an open -exhaust cruise night around a
"parade route" that is inside the show boundery. Obviously you get lots
of race cars showing up to drive around uncorked while the cops just
watch.
Chevrolet is one of the sponsors of the event and has several big tents
devoted to current model year cars, historic Chevrolet muscle-cars, the
GM Performance Parts program and other displays. Originally the Return to
the Road was going to end in Santa Monica CA which, where old US 66
ended, however, the organizers of the Rendezvous, convinced Chevy to
finish the Return to the Road with the caravan of 20 new Corvette
Convertibles taking a lap around the parade route on Saturday night and
again on Sunday afternoon.
And what an experience that was! This year, the Rendezvous had just a
hair less than 2400 entries. All of these were parked on the streets of
downtown San Berdo...every kind of enthusiast car and truck you can
imagine was on display.
But, if that wasn't enough, Saturday evening there were 110,000 people
(according to the event organizers and the San Bernardino Police
Depertment) lining the parade/cruise route. The RttR Tour arrived in
prime time, about an hour before sundown on Saturday. We took 1.5 laps
around the route prior to putting all 20 cars in a display lot adjacent
to the Chevy tents for a couple of hours.
Driving the next to last car of 20 new Vettes in front of 110,000 people
was, to say the least, a memorable experience! My ony regret was that I
was driving the only car with an empty passenger seat and not one of the
babilicous heartthrobs to whom I offered a ride would jump in.
(sob)
This cruise along the Rendezvous route was further proof that almost
everyone loves the Americaon icon that is Corvette. Generally, the '98
Convertible has been unseen by the general public, so this was a debut of
sorts. By the time my car (the 19th in the caravan) came by, people were
edging up close and some touched it as it went by, some high-fived me and
everyone was either waving, yelling or both. Quite an experience to say
the least. It was really cool to see so many people who like Vettes.
Along the way I saw some of the Southern California Corvette club
community. I know many of you and if I didn't yell "Hi" or wave to each
one of you, I am sorry I missed you. It was nice to see so many friends
in the crowd.
The day leading up to the parade at the Rendzevous was filled with
driving across the hot, hot, hot Mojave Desert from Needles to Barstow.
All of us on VN have computers, a word to the wise about Needles
California. 1) appearently the city has an antiquated phone system that
is very troublesome if you need to connect to your ISP and surf or
collect mail 2) don't stay at a place called the Travler's Inn. Besides
having very noisy air conditioners making it hard to sleep, their phone
rates are exhorbitant and, in spite of admitting their phone service is
substandard, they will not offer complete refunds on calls where your
internet connection is lost through the local phone company's bad service.
Ordinarily, one would take Interstate 40 from Needles to Barstow, which
is one of the most boring drives in the southwest but we took to old
route 66, also known as "National Trails Highway" in places, through,
near ghost-towns of Ludlow, Amboy and Yermo. It was just as hot, but
there was more interesting scenery, almost no traffic and it was a
beautiful, crystal-clear day in the desert. About 10:30, we were in Amboy
for a potty/cold drink stop at a place called "Roy's".
Thirty years ago,
before the Interstate went through, I bet Roys was a hot spot on US66 but
today it's pretty ragged looking and business is a bit slow.
Nevertheless, Roy's represents history....a different time when highway
travel in this country was not near as fast or as reliable. Roy's is
also, appearently, a favorite of the California Highway Patrol. While all
20 Corvettes stopped for a rest, a CHP heliocopter circled and landed.
The turbines shut off and the Officers got out to have a cool drink.
Interestingly they didn't pay much attention to the 20 red/white/blue
Corvettes. They kinda had a been-there-done-that attitude. Maybe they had
been our unseen "air support" since we started in Needles that morning.
In Barstow California we stopped at the local Chevy dealer for lunch and
a short display. While the dealer did not do much to support the Return
to the Road, the local Corvette Clubs did turn out in-force. Leaving
Barstow, we picked up about 25 Corvettes that tailed the main caravan.
From Barstow, we ran along old 66 to Victorville and onto I-15, through
Cajon Pass to San Bernardino. Headed southwest out of Victorville on
I-15, we saw some pretty significant traffic on an 8-lane-wide section of
freeway. You can bet the caravan, which was lead and tailed by big, green
Suburbans with Return to the Road grapics and yellow-blinking light bars,
got lots of attention.
The Return to the Road officially ended with a second appearance by the
20 Corvette Convertibles at the Route 66 Rendezvous on Sunday morning.
While the crowd wasn't near as large, we still had thoursands of people
looking at, touching and wanting to talk about the Corvette. I can tell you
that Chevrolet has no idea how many people we Corvette writers talk to. I
probably sold half-a-dozen cars on Saturday and Sunday night. We were at
the Rendezvous for another 2-3 hours and then it was off to a photoshoot
at the nearby California Speedway.
It was about the only place close by
that had clean background and a space big enough to photograph all 20
cars in a four-abrest, color-coordinated shot. After that, we drove all
the cars a few more miles down the freeway to the Ontario Airport Hilton
Hotel where the they were cleaned out and loaded onto transporters. We
all said our goodbys and headed home. After two-weeks, the Return to the
Road Tour was over.
Lastly, some words about the hardware. The Corvette Convertible I drove:
The paint was very good. What a georgeous color. Obviously the new paint shop
is up to speed! The car drove great. The six-speed, with the 98
shifter modification, was like a hot knife through butter. The fuel pump
was virtually silent. With the top down, the exhaust rumble is music to
my ears. In spite of the temperature close to 100 degrees on Sunday
afternoon, during our second trip around the Route 66 Rendezvous, I never
saw higher than 225 degrees on the temp gauge. I loved that car. FYI, the
sticker on the fully-optioned Convertible (six-speed, auto air, F45, etc,
etc) I drove in the Return to the Road was a hair over $49,000.
Thanks to Chevy for inviting me on the Return to the Road and I hope you
enjoyed this report.
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