Ferrari Mailing List: Crowdsourcing our Sea-to-Shining-Sea Rally: Eastern US route

[Dennis Liu (bigheaddennis]

First off, I want to convey my gratitude again at everyone that responded.
We're getting closer on the details, and I'm anticipating when I'll be able
to tell you more - very soon.  

(And if you do reply, please make sure to include my email directly in your
response, as I'm not subscribed to the Flist)


Anyway, I've penciled in the Manhattan to Denver leg of the trip (still
working on the "fun" stuff West of Denver, though it depends in part on
whether a certain former late night talk show host may want to meet up with
us and if we can weasel a garage tour :-) .  We'll take 3 days to get to
Denver, then 4-5 days to get to Monterey.

Here it is, and any further refinements, suggestions or WARNINGS would be
very much appreciated!

Sunday:  Manhattan to Hot Springs, West Virginia.  500 miles, approximately
11 hours, but we should be able to shave an hour off that, though we may
well lose it for photo stops, etc.  This takes us out of Manhattan and onto
I-78 through Allentown and Harrisburg, PA.  This route allows us to avoid
the usual weekend Eastern Seaboard Metropolis traffic.  Then onto I-81,
through the corner of Maryland, to Front Royal, VA - the Northern terminus
of the legendary Skyline Drive and Blue Ridge Parkway,
http://www.blueridgeskyline.com/.  It'll be a Sunday in August, so there'll
be traffic, but it's beautiful.  All the way down Skyline Drive, which goes
through the heart of Shenandoah National Park.  At the Southern terminus, we
will continue onto the Blue Ridge Parkway, but if the traffic is horrendous,
or if we've been otherwise delayed, we can bail off of Skyline at a couple
of different points and get onto I-81).  We exit off the Blue Ridge Parkway
on Rt 56 (north of Montebello, VA) and take some state roads to Hot Springs,
WV, where we overnight here:  http://www.thehomestead.com/

Monday:  Hot Springs, WV to St Louis, Missouri.  686 miles, approximately 12
hours, though, again, we should be able to shave an hour off.  We start the
morning by driving through the Highland Scenic Highway,
http://www.byways.org/explore/byways/2460/travel.html, in the Monongahela
National Forest, http://www.fs.fed.us/r9/mnf/general_info/intro.shtml.  We
pick up I-64 just SW of Charleston, WV and start flying out west, through
Louisville, KY, and overnight in St Louis, MO.

Tuesday:  St Louis, MO to Denver, CO.  850 miles, about 12.5 hours, but we
should be ashamed if we can't do it in 11 hours, since it's all highway, on
I-70.  We'll stop in Kansas City for some REAL BBQ.

Total mileage for this leg:  approximately 2,036 miles, or 35 hours (or 32
for us).  The direct highway shot between Manhattan and Denver is 1800
miles, though it's probably a realistic 26 hours total, so we're adding 6
hours with our scenic touring.

Thx,

--Dennis