WOW!
Totally cruised out after a totally awesome weekend --
First, Saturday was a blast after an early 5 am start here at home base [with the usual pre-cruise breakfast at the Lodi TA]. It was too foggy to take the normal backroads, so tested the new cab lights going down I-71 to Cbus for the United Ford Owners / Earth Angel Charity Cruise at Ricart Mega Automall. Got there early, and changed the rear red cab lenses to the four orange ones for the show and looked forward to helping out the car club in any way that I could to help out such a worthy charity!
[I normally don't enter the car since it is an "all weather beater" and love running it thru the mud after it rains, but Earth Angel is such a worth cause and have several UFO members who participate in the foundation, so it was definitely worth any support given!]
After parking all of the fabulous show cars, it was time to wind things down and pack things up, changing the rear orange roofers back to red for the evening trip back up north, and getting near 6pm and after a brief spritz of rain on an otherwise perfect afternoon, and headed back up I-71 to Mansfield to the Springmill Drive In Theatre just off of US 30 on Springmill Road to see "UP" and "Star Trek" [for the third time]. I got there a half hour early before the gates were to open, so cruised Route 39 up north past Shelby, and doubled back thru town and back to Springmill Drive-In, where cars were gathering in the drive and was able to get a great spot back along the concession stand [since it was origionally a single screen theatre and made the far back rows into a second screening area].
UP was an ok movie [nothing real special about the animation, and the story line kinda got stretched a bit at the end], and STAR TREK was just as awesome as the first time [will be seeing it again tomorrow over at Field of Dreams Drive-In in Liberty Center, Ohio]. Got out late as usual, and took US 30 back to US 42 North and cruised up to Ashland to get some go-go juice on US 250 [kinda running out and did a gas-and-go] then back up I-71 to home base until tomorrow's "Cannonball Run" .
Sunday is another beautiful day for a Cruise and a Movie! Filled up the tank the rest of the way in Medina and headed out Route 18 to Field of Dreams Drive-In Theatre in Liberty Center Ohio in NW Ohio. Passed Norwalk / Summit Dragway and got on US 20 and continued heading East, and although I have been to Bowling Green before and looked on the map several times [always preplanning each trip way in advance so that time isn't wasted on the side of the road looking at maps] I did get lost momentarily when I mistook a Route 6 heading 'East' exit -- knowing full well I needed to take Route 6 'West' all the way over to Henry County to Liberty Center -- and I knew it wasn't right so got off and found an empty parking lot and got back on heading in the right direction. After passing I-75 for a few miles, I saw 6 of the ugliest wind propellers alongside the road, placed appropriately in the Wood County Landfill two hundred or so feet up in the air and are what I consider a complete eyesore -- thank goodness it would be dark when I passed them again!
Finally got to Field of Dreams Theatre just north of Liberty Center after a 140 mile cruise -- its intereting that Henry County is one of the only counties here in Ohio that uses letters of the alphabet for it's north-south county roads, and numbers its east-west back roads, but it is nice that they have nice big green square placards marking each road for us "foriegners" -- and like in the movie "Field of Dreams" it literally is "Build it and they will come" as someone actually build a small drive in theatre in thier backyard as a screen was built on several telephone poles and the projection house was made of cinderblocks!
Several cornhole boards were available, as well as a volleyball sand lot and net were also available and a game was well underway, with folks welcomed to join in as more cars [including a white Ford Torino Convertable] made their way to Field of Dreams. Concessions consisted of a utitlity truck converted for food service, and before the movie started, the owner invited anyone who wanted to see how the projection booth operated to come on over see inside the inner workings of the theatre. The movies, btw, were NIGHT AT THE MUSEUM and STAR TREK, and both were well worth the drive all the way over in far NW corner of Ohio [in fact, I rank Field of Dreams Drive-In #2 overall of drive-in theatres I have so far visited!]
Before heading back, had the inevitable dead battery of a group of folks parked just in front of me, so had the drive-in staff with their portable charger [but the guy was driving a Saturn, and for some reason their battery is in the trunk] and offered up my flashlight as well, but their charger wasn't working so went into AAA mode and got the jumper cables out of the trunk and opened up the hood and after a couple of good revs of the engine, got them started and on their way! Headed back out out Route 6, but headed south when I got to Route 53 towards Tiffen [to find the Tiffin Drive-In [when the UFO Ford Club heads up to Fords at Summit in July so I can go their after a days worth of All Ford entertainment] but can't really find anything in the dark so did a brief cruise thru Tiffin and picked up Route 18 and took that back to homebase until the next Great American Cruise!
Movies: A -
Cruise: A +
Overall: A
