Update - 9/15 9:53pm
I went the easy route and created a Photoshop web gallery of the photos I took:
http://www.c3vr.com/events/hersheyweb/
Enjoy!

Original Message - 9/14
I arrived our hotel at 7pm on the nose Friday evening. As I pulled in, I saw many people hovering around many C3s all parked under the canopy of the hotel! Someone shouted "It's about time!" to me, as I turned into the lot.

I got out and met everyone, checked in, threw my stuff in my room, then we all headed next-door to a neat Deli/Restaurant. We spent a couple of hours there chatting and eating. Next it was on to a different location for some drinks and more conversation. A few headed to bed an hour or so later, and I bailed around 11, feeling very sleepy, but others stayed. Having drank two Mt. Dews & an Iced Tea, plus a "Fudgy Wudgy" for desert at dinner, I was too caffeinated (despite the few alcoholic drinks I had later) to sleep. I didn't fall asleep till around 2:30am.

Sleeping poorly, I had to get up around 6am Saturday morning to get ready to meet everyone at 7am. We all met in the lot of the hotel and drove over to a restaurant for breakfast, which fortunately was literally right next to the staging area we had to go to for the parade.

As mentioned in another thread, the morning was a soaked, soggy mess! However, before it started to rain, we managed to get a decent group photo of all the C3s, hopefully to be used on the cover of the 2004 Member Calendar. After breakfast we all move our cars over to the staging area and walked around and chatted, wiped down the cars, took pictures, etc. I managed to fashion a way to hang a C3VR banner to the right side of my Vette, hopefully to be seen by the TV cameras as we moved down the parade route. Not long after, it rained, then it rained some more and rained, and rained. So we left our cars and walked back over to the restaurant for some refreshments and dry air.

About 11:30am, we headed back out in the rain and got in our cars to wait for the start of the parade. Occasionally, the rain would stop, and we'd wipe down the cars, but then, it would rain again. A leak of some sort was noticed coming from the right front engine compartment of Ann's (luvmy76) Vette. Thought to be coming from the A/C compressor or fuel pump but we couldn't be sure due to the fact that we could not get her hood open.

Around 12:45 we started moving. The rain had finally stopped! It was a slow "move a little, wait a little" process. I personally got into the parade around 2ish riding next to Deb (curvy79). I coxed her into having some fun with the crowd first by waving, then revving the engine, and finally we got daring and started to do some short burn outs. These were pretty easy considering the ground was still wet. The crowd loved it! I'm not so sure the parade staff did, though. As we neared the grandstand and TV broadcast area, we seemed to have an escort tagging along behind us. I'm not sure why he was there, but my guilty conscience tells me it was because of the burn outs. I guess I'll never know, unless they contact me about it. Finally I could see the TV broadcast booth and the cameras. I was excited to be on TV, and especially to have the C3VR banner on TV! We had a marching band in front of us, and as they were almost past the end of the grandstand area, I noticed the overhead camera stopped moving, and the camera man working the booth seemed to be relaxing... so I figured, "great! they just went to commercial!!!" I was p-oed to say the least! But, we carried on with the rest of the parade route, with escort still behind me. Deb got a little gutsy once or twice more and gave the crowd a little something to cheer about.

After we reached the end of the parade route, some of us pulled off to the side of the road and watched some of the other parade participants finish their part. I also got to meet Miss Teen USA who had been driven through the parade in one of C3VR member's cars - Francis23b (Brenda) and her husband Gary. Then we broke off for a little while, so I could go shopping to get supplies for the BBQ.

George (yellownredvette) and I brought back all the fixins for our BBQ back at the hotel. The BBQ was a lot of fun... eating, drinking and being merry. We reviewed each of our experiences in the parade. The parade telecast was being rerun on a cable station, so I ran in to my room to catch some of it, and sure enough, I was right! They cut to commercial immediately before me, Deb and the others in our group were about to hit the grandstand area!!! If you look hard during the band, you can see us behind them. Oh well! Things started to wind down around 8pm since we all had a really long, wet day! I headed to bed while a handful of others stuck around a little while longer.

Sunday morning started around 8am for me, meeting everyone at 9am to head out for breakfast. We had a 9am reservation (that I made 7 months ago, and confirmed Saturday night). I tired to call at 8:55am to tell them we were running late but got a voice mail system. We walked in the place at 9:15 and were told "you're late, we already sat people at your tables". Fortunately, I didn't have to get all angry, since they were able to seat us right away, but 4 of us had to sit a different table.

After breakfast, we got some final group photos and then broke off into two groups. Some went home, others, including myself went to Chocolate World to do the factory tour ride. The ride was short, but cute. As we were walking out, we were selected to do a taste test of some chocolates, which was actually quite fun and neat. Then, I had to be off, so I hit the road.

All in all, I had a great time! Despite the weather, it seemed everyone else had a great time too. I was very happy to meet so many C3VR members, and see others again that I had met before. I have a horrible memory, so I figured I better get this in writing now! Being that I have such a horrible memory, I do not remember everyone's spouses' names. My apologies. Here is a list of who made it:
STINGRAYBS (Jim) and his wife
chris0331 (Christine) and her husband Jim
Biff77 (Biff) and his wife June (but not his Vette :(
bcliff (Tom)
Cilla and husband Ron
Joebutera (Joe) and his wife
yellownredvette (George) and his son
vetlover (John) and his wife Pam (but not his Vette :(
wijaco (Bill) and his wife Jan
luvmy76 (Ann) and her son Michael
curvy79 (Deb) and her "other half" Richard
Francis23b (Brenda) and her husband Gary
JacksL71 (John)
tricer (Terrence) and his wife
Sarge81 (Darryl) and his wife Michelle
glenns (Glenn) and his wife
DIE4RED (Howard) and his wife Cindy
fun71 (Joe) and his family
davette71 (Dave) and his family
Bob Griffiths and his wife
and me (Adam).
Please let me know if I forgot anyone, and please fill in spouse names!

People who were expected but did not attend were: crazcorkath and brian7836. I'm guessing they bailed because of the weather, but I haven't heard from them.

Thanks to EVERYONE that came out for making this such a fun, worthwhile and entertaining event! I'm sure this was a memorable occasion for all of us!

I'll be posting pictures soon...

|UPDATED|9/16/2003 10:04:09 AM|/UPDATED|

Great review, Adam.

My short recap of the weekend, along with some pix, can be found at: http://gateway.ca.k12.pa.us/cahs/vette.htm

Anyone with more pix of the weekend, please send them to Adam at:
SharkBytes@C3VR.com

He can then get them to me. Thanks. Biff

Hi Adam,

What a great (although soggy) time!

The kids all had a great time in the parade. Special thanks to Tom (Bcliff) for allowing my 7 year old Jordan to sit in his car during the parade
It was great to meet so many of you folks! Hope everyone had a safe ride home.

~ Joe

|UPDATED|9/16/2003 6:38:01 PM|/UPDATED|

Hi all! Adam was right it was a great time! the mysterious fluid turned out to be radiator fluid due to a belt shredding that finally gave out just before the exit for rts. 11&15! Very scary time as i slowed to 30mph and then coasted in neutral down a hill to be able to pull to the side of the road on a bridge! was able to open hood were i saw when the smoke cleared the belt! then after i called 911 sarge aka darryll and his wife michelle who we had been caravanning with noticed i wasn't there and found me! we got the car off to the exit ramp where our knight in shining armour,darryll, not only went and found a parts store but came back and changed the belt and we were able to be on our way as luckily no damage was done to the engine Thank you,Thank you and Thank you again sarge81 and Michelle.We still owe you the beers and dinner which we will repay BEFORE Bowling Green all in all a fun weekend which my son and I will never forget

Hi Adam,
I just wanted to take a moment to say "Thank You" for your time and effort in putting this all together. Job well done! Michele and I had a great time despite the the rain. And it was great to finally meet some of the C3VR members. I wish that we all could have spent a little more time together. It's kind of hard to spread the time around with each member with so little time. But, it was a pleasure meeting and talking with all you guys and gals that attended. We are looking forward to the next get together. Thanks Again Adam!

BTW, next time someone needs to remind me that I have to purchase my beer on Saturday (for home) I tried Sunday with no luck. I forgot about that law.

Sarge

You are quite welcome Ann, the words Thank You have a big meaning in my book. I would help out anybody anytime if I can. ttyl.

|UPDATED|9/15/2003 8:26:30 AM|/UPDATED|

Adam.......here's some help with names of spouses.

Chris0331, husband: Jim
Biff77, wife: June
vetlover, wife: Pam
wijaco, wife: Jan

Hope it helps. Biff

Hey Sarge, great that you could get Ann on her way.

Our hero:


|UPDATED|9/15/2003 10:28:50 AM|/UPDATED|

Adam,

Bob Griffiths was there with his wife.

You were lucky Anne! We were on our way home and blew an alternator belt and nothing was open. We stayed over at a hotel in Clinton, NJ and had it fixed in the morning. Other than that I had a great time meeting everyone. And kudos to you Adam for putting it all together. Deb

You forgot to say just how hard it rained.....

This is NOT the review you asked for... just some of my comments about the weekend...

I gave up on parades because I have burned my clutch out
one too many times so Barbara and I walked to the start of the parade.. only a mile and a half (measured after the walk)..and it took us an hour and 15 minutes...BUT we were
strolling in the rain looking at some cars talking to rain soaked Band members etc....and of course we both had saturated shoes and socks by the time the parage .. I got the chance to exchange a few words with the Grand Marshall (SWillard Scott) and had to get in a crack about the weather but he still laughed and shoke my hand...

The Parage was a GREAT one... 7000 + marchers and a few
cars...(The Corvettes were by far the most numerious make...)... I was impressed by the Penn State Band
(the blue band..do they have more then one band???) and the High School band that had a complete section of Bag Pipe players...never saw a HS band with pipers in my life...and the one HS Alumni band was cool... 40 year old
majorettes were still looking good... lol

Really enjoyed myself...Barbara was fast asleep and missed the BBQ ...Hey if one of the Parade Staff had not drove us both back to the hotel in his gold cart after the parade I would have been asleep also...

We did try to go to the Sunday Breakfast but could not find Libbie what the hell's place so we drove over to
Friendlies.

Actually I enjoyed the weekend very much dispite the rain... always a major plus to actually get to meet some of the group members...next time Adam buy a cheap grill however and leave it at the Hotel.. cheaper and the clerk would not complain about the gift I'm sure...

Driving home I had a hell of a time getting out of Hershey...wife told me they would not let us out until we bought some candy...but eventually we got out of town...
hit some more rain .(and the darn wiper doors refused to come all the way up)... had to reach around the pillar and give them a nudge then lock them up...oh well it will be another 5 -6 years before that car sees rain again anyway...

Hope this type of weekend is scheduled every year..HONEST...

Fot those of you who are doing the Corvette Weekend at Ocean City Maryland ..look for me on 5th steeet sitting on the 2nd floor balcony of the comfort inn drinking bloody maries and
having another Corvette weekend...just hope it is as nice as the C3 meeting...Also doing the Skyline drive cruise in late October...

I do not know if Bob got the part number for the selonoid spring ..I sent an IM on this form to him)..but if he
missed it... here it is again...A/C Delco spring number 1958679... 5 bucks and say goodbye to heat soak no starts... lol

Bob Griffiths

Deb....that's too bad about the alternator belt. believe me I know how you feel! Now don't forget to give us an update about your swimming with the dolphins, I'd love to hear about it and pics would be good too ....annie