HISTORICAL INFORMATION:
Drift-In '08 will be in Maggie Valley, NC. Dates are July 9 - 12, 2008. The "Dog Pound" is the Apple Cover Inn and RV Park, past the Wheels Through Time Motorcycle Museum, on the left, as you head west-bound through Maggie Valley towards Soco Gap.
HOTEL INFO:
Apple Cover Inn: Information and Registration - Apple Cover Inn is full. They only have 21 rooms.
Other Hotels: There are several other motels across the street and down the road from the Apple Cover Inn.
ITINERARY:
July 9 - Registration and Check-In; Group rides
July 10 - Group Ride
July 11 - Group Ride; Band @ Apple Cover Inn:
For Friday evening, July 11, I will have a band playing for us at the Apple Cover Inn. They are called Asheville Junction, the drummer is a buddy who rides with us named Mick Blackmore. They play classic rock and blues and are very good !! This will be around 8pm - 10pm after everyone has a chance to eat supper.
July 12 - Short Group Ride and Awards and Bike Show:
Saturday would require a shorter ride.. I'm thinking of a ride through Nantahala and doing the Cherahala Skyway.
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The Awards Banquet and Bike Show will be held in Maggie Valley, Sat. July 12, at the Smoky Falls Lodge ( neat place, looks like a huge hunting lodge) on the main drag ( Soco Road/ Hwy 19). We will start parking everyone for the bike show at 6:00 pm. I plan to park the bikes at the back of the lodge, we will have it all to ourselves as their is a gate for the road and no cars will be allowed in the back.
There is a great area which is creekside on a nice lawn which will be great for photographs. We can go from there right into the Banquet Room (in the Grizzly Grill) in the Lodge for dinner at 6:30 pm, it is a buffet so there is something for everybody. Cost is $15 per person which includes dinner, tea or soft drinks, and all gratuities:; also there is beer, wine, and a full bar which will be pay-as-you-go. |
GROUP RIDES:
We have 4 days, Wed - Sat, to do group rides. It is tough to narrow it down to only 4 major rides, but here's what I'm thinking of doing:
1) The Tail of the Dragon ride, of course: Maggie Valley > Hwy 19 over the Soco Gap to Cherokee > Hwy 28 Stecoah, Fontana > Hwy 129, Deals Gap, where the Dragon begins the 318 curves in 11 miles into Tennessee. We can do the Dragon south-to-north, then again north-to-south if that is the consensus. We can return partially on the Great Smoky Mtns Expressway, which would be a good opportunity to get some pics of the group and individuals in motion. Thursday would be a good day for this ride, after everyone warms up to the curves on Wednesday.
2) Great Smoky Mtns. National Park (Hwy 441): Maggie Valley > Cherokee > Hwy 441 thru the Great Smoky Mtns to Gatlinburg, TN., with a side trip thru Cade's Cove Loop.
3) Mt. Pisgah ride: Maggie Valley > Hwy 276 > Blue Ridge Parkway (South) thru all the tunnels up to Mt. Pisgah -- great vistas along this part of the Parkway as the elevation rises. Return to Maggie via Hwy 251, the Devil's Drop, back to Hwy. 19-23 > Waynesville and Maggie Valley.
LOCAL ATTRACTIONS:
1) The Biltmore Estate- House, Gardens, and Winery. Explore America's largest home, George Vanderbilt's 250 room
palace, set on 8000 gorgeous acres in Asheville, NC. Entrance is in Biltmore Village, south Asheville, I-26 exit 50.
2) Great Smoky Mountains Railroad. Take a scenic rail journey aboard a classic diesel or vintage steam passenger train.
Dillsboro and Bryson City, NC.
3) Wheels Through Time. An awesome award winning motorcycle museum right in Maggie Valley, down the street from the Apple Cover Inn.
4) Ghosttown. An authentic 1880 Western town with rides, attactions, and gunfights in the street. Take the chairlift or the incline railroad
and travel 3400 feet up Buck Mountain for wild west adventure on the summit overlooking Maggie Valley.
5) Visit "Connemara", the 245 acre estate of renowned biographer, poet, and folk singer Carl Sandburg,
in Flat Rock, near Hendersonville. A National Historic Site.
6) Just east of Maggie Valley lies Asheville, the regional center of activities in Western North Carolina, in the heart of the
Blue Ridge Mountains, surrounded by more than 100 peaks over 5000 feet. Enjoy the Biltmore Estate, historic downtown Asheville's
shops, art, museums, the Thomas Wolfe House, Pack Place, the Grove Arcade Building and Shops, and the historic Asheville Urban Trail.
Click on the link, then select ATTACTIONS under "Visitor Center" for complete details of where to go and what to do.
7) Take in the culture, history, and attactions of the Cherokee Indian Reservation, just over the Soco Gap from Maggie Valley.
Amazing shops, native arts and crafts, Oconaluftee Indian Village, museums, the huge Harrah's Cherokee Casino, and much more.
8) Travel one of America's most scenic mountain roads, US Hwy 441 (stop at the site where President Frankin D. Roosevelt dedicated the
Great Smoky Mountains National Park in 1940) through the Great Smoky Mtns from Cherokee, NC to historic Gatlinburg, Tennessee, where you will enjoy the scenery, shops, and attractions in this Alpine mountain village, including the massive Ripley's Aquarium of the Smokys.
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