Dear fellow caravaners and corvette enthusiasts,
This is the first update on the 2003 National Corvette Caravan leaving the Northwest on June 21, 2003. If some information is repetitive, bear with me.
This is the 3rd caravan. The first caravan was in 1994 for the grand opening of the national corvette museum. The second caravan occured in 1999 for the 5th anniversary of the opening of the National Corvette Museum. This latest (3rd caravan) will commemorate the 50th anniversary of the corvette. The actual anniversary date is June 30, 1953. The northwest caravan will be leaving from Seattle, Spokane and Portland areas and will meet in or near Pendleton where we will have lunch. We will then drive to Ontario, OR at the border with Idaho where we will meet the Boise corvette club who will escort us into Boise for the first days' stop. For the rest of the itinerary go to
www.corvettemuseum.com and click under caravan and then under WA or OR for the route info. Hotel stops along the way are listed with phone#s-check this under Route on the OR/WA websites. Click on Hotels for the Bowling Green Kentucky area hotels. Most hotels are full so you may have to stay in Nashville. Consider staying just North of Bowling Green. If you want to stay in Nashville go to the 50th anniversary site ( reachable from the opening page of the corvette museum site). They can register you online (5,000 rooms reserved) It will be slightly cheaper if you go through the hotel individually if they are not completely reserved.
Remember the 50th anniversary site is Chevrolet's and their marketing arm. We (caravan and National corvette museum) have nothing to do with what Chevrolet is doing in Nashville. We have a hard time getting them to tell us what is planned in Nashville-GM is slow to decide. Also there is a $50 charge per person for the Nashville events. Registering ofor the caravan gets you into all the museum Bowling Green events.
What we do know is: the Northwest Caravan leaves the Northwest June 21 and arrives in Bowling Green June 25 (Wednesday) Friday and Saturday( June 27 +28) have events all day in Nashville sponsored by Chevrolet. Saturday may be a duplicate of Friday with a concert added Saturday night. There will be multiple caravans leaving Bowling Green on Friday and Saturday for Nashville. There are 5000 reserved parking corvette spaces in Nashville. Only those with a sticker from the museum will get reserved parking. Right now it looks like you will pick up the sticker at the museum the morning of Friday or Saturday. Those staying in Nashville will need to use their hotel shuttles. We are expecting 10,000 corvettes so there is not enough parking for everyone in Nashville. There will be Corvette factory tours Wed- Friday with more info on that to follow. Thursday, Sunday and Monday will be events at the museum. There will be autocrossing and drag racing all weekend long. Updates will follow.
Now the most important info: We have 45 paid NW caravaners so far. There were more than 2,000 registered total throughout the US/ Canada as of 6 weeks ago. Rooms in Bowling Green are hard to find- Reserve Bowling Green Rooms NOW even if you aren't sure you are going!!!!!! The Saturday night stop in Boise will be at the Doubletree downtown on the river-very nice!! Reserve this room NOW (208-343-1871). There is another big event the same weekend. We have 75 rooms reserved. I expect at least 100 from the Northwest. You do the math-someone won't get a room in the main hotel. We will have other options later but they will not be as convenient. The other hotel rooms along the way will be easier to obtain. (If you want to stay with our NW group-stay at the hotel listed as "leaders will stay here")
There is 50th anniversary merchandise available at the corvette museum website. Anything you see at the 50th anniversary store is also at the National Corvette Museum Store. If you are a museum member you save 10%. Support the Museum!!! Also we have Caravan Flags for $15 and window decals (clings) for $10 plus shipping. These provide money for the caravan or the museum. Contact me or one of the NW leaders if you want one. All leader are total volunteers. The Seattle area leader is Ron and Gina Eden- email
asacaptain@attbi.com or phone # 253-874-9887. The Spokane leader is Grant Oberg 509 764 8519 e-mail
C5Grant@msn.com.
Questions? Contact us!
Bob Gunderman
NW 2003 National Corvette Caravan Captain
e-mail:
fawnden@WORLDNET.ATT.NET
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