MTTS 2010 roads

Posted on by Ian C.

I’ve been trying to review MINI Takes The States 2010 to see where they plan to send our MINIs, and whether I want to “go with the flow” or just join the group sometimes … for example, I might prefer two nights in Las Vegas, by skipping Phoenix!
Trouble is, MINI really haven’t published anything yet! They’ve named hotels, and said there will be Rise & Shine rallies – but no route details and nothing about other possible events at the intermediate hotels … so time to figure things out for myself!

Looking at the route around Winter Park, CO, i see this:


And way back in 2003, Margaret and I found Nebo Loop Scenic Byway south of Salt Lake City, UT – I said at the time it was a MINI road, so we should definitely try to drive it!

Nebo Loop, Utah

 

I wonder how many more interesting places there are …

MINIsOnTop 2010 Packing day

Posted on by Ian C.

A little strange after the last few years – but for MINIsOnTop 2010 I’m just helping out the organizers Richard and Sarah; and today headed in to Boston to assist with packing day. Once again, around 230 MINIs and close to 500 people will be attending, so it’s a few hours of work putting together 230+ mailing packages containing the needed MOT booklet and other paperwork, meal and auto road tickets, Tshirts, antenna balls, cling decals, etc, etc.
Of course, I took a few pictures too 🙂

Tasks divided, with different people focusing on different parts of the job, makes for fastest packing – Lynn did auto road and food tickets, Richard sorted name tags and checked envelopes, Sarah checked / applied address labels, while Michael and Josh selected Tshirts (I drove the front end, with the easy task of putting “same for everyone” stuff in each envelope!); and to ensure the least chance of folks getting the wrong stuff, we had Quality Control check each envelope – Brian, Kevin and Shannon!

If you’re registered for MINIsOnTop, expect a package in the next week … if not, sorry it’s too late now!

MINI Takes The States 2010 – new plan!

Posted on by Ian C.

So a couple weeks ago I booked to drive MTTS2010 from Atlanta to Denver; I was not at that time sure I could do it work-wise but I’ve now basically discussed and decided “yes” pretty well “no matter what”. In general I can do quite a lot of work while away from the office, for a short time at least – and August is always quiet at least with our European customers, so it should work out well.

I didn’t know if Margaret would join me, and wasn’t sure what George would be doing either (he’s been rather busy with other aspects of his life recently!), but hoped we might be able to do at least a partial-repeat of fabulous MTTS2006 …

 

I also had not figured what to do after MTTS2010, ending in the middle of the country in Denver; one idea was to maybe find a friend to leave the car with till AMVIV (assuming it happens in 2011).

Then I learned that George planned to get his car to the West coast, and drive the West MTTS route – which I have to admit is a much more interesting route, as it goes through my favorite places of Las Vegas and Utah!
Margaret said she’d like to join me – but wouldn’t it be good to start from the West coast as that way she’d be able to do “coast to coast” across USA (which I did but she did not, back in 2006!)

Finally, my friend Robert offered parking for GP0203 at his home near Los Angeles … then offered something even more interesting: a way to get GP0203 out there, from it’s home in Florida!

So, with huge thanks to Robert, and thanks also to Michelle at MTTS registration, I’ve switched my Atlanta sign-up to Los Angeles. GPMINI will get to the West coast before Margaret and I do, we will get to drive Phoenix, Las Vegas, Utah and Salt Lake City, and Denver in the GP – and then figure something for afterwards, before returning the GP to Florida!

MTTS2010 planned route

August 2010 should be just as much fun as August 2006 was 🙂