
Meanwhile, this post is quite late in getting made. If you read my last post about the death of my Compaq laptop, you have some idea why that is. Back on January 10th, the Tar Heel MINI Motoring Club made their first run of the new year - a run up to Stone Mountain and then on to Sparta for some lunch.


While starting out as your basic two-lane country road, as we neared Stone Mountain the twisty factor increased dramatically and it was a nice opportunity for our Minis to enjoy themselves (drivers and passengers as well). Along the way we hit the entrance to Stone Mountain Park and headed up into the park. While quite twisty, this was a park road and demanded some very conservative driving. Not only were there quite a few other visitors to the park, there were numerous deer. (Yes, that is the part that sends shivers down my back.) Once we made it to the end of the paved portion of the road, we all stopped for a little break and stretch our legs. Then it was back out of the park the way we came, and a short drive on into to Sparta.
The originally planned route - view larger map

Unfortunately, my schedule did not permit me to take such a long detour. And I was all turned around which led to me taking Hwy 18 the wrong way out of town to complete the originally mapped loop. So I ended up taking Hwy 18 north up to close to the VA line where I caught Hwy 89. That had a great twisty section for the first 4-5 miles, though it was tempered somewhat by a slow VW (Rabbit I think) taking it extremely slow down the mountain.
The alternate route that most of the group took - view larger map
So even though I missed the last little bit, it was still a great way to get 2009 started. Now I only need to figure out something for February (or hope someone else posts something soon). I'm hoping this year I can pull at least one eve---er, motor each month. That will be a challenge with all the other stuff in my life.
As always, there is a complete photo gallery available (which I managed to get a few pics even though my camera had been knocked to manual focus without me knowing about it until I checked at the Stone Mountain stop).
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