Winston's Most Excellent Adventure!
Winston Whitlock, my friend for more than thirty years, got his first Corvette yesterday (Tuesday, January 24th). When he told me he was going to get a C6 Corvette, I encouraged (browbeat?) him to get his C6 delivered at the National Corvette Museum in Bowling Green, KY. There is a Regular Production Option (RPO) on the Corvette order sheet that makes this happen; it's a great experience. When you buy a Corvette, ask your dealer for RPO #R8C. It costs $490 and it's worth that and more!
Winston ordered his C6 from Bruce Glueck Chevrolet in Jasper, FL. Corvette specialist
has made Bruce Glueck Chevy one of the most prolific dealers when it comes to NCM delivery. She makes it all sooooooo easy!
Though I've owned eight Corvettes (so far) I've never been fortunate enough to have one delivered at the NCM (that will change shortly) so I eagerly accepted Winston's invitation to go along with him to get his C6.
Monday, January 23rd
We flew from Atlanta to Nashville, TN and rented a Malibu for the just-over-an-hour drive from Nashville to Bowling Green KY. We arrived handily about 6pm, had dinner and turned in early; the Delivery procedure begins tomorrow at 7:45am (ugh!)
Tuesday, January 24th
After an "inncredible breakfast" at the Country Hearth Inn:
across the street from the National Corvette Museum (you know it's "inncredible" since the big sign outside says so!)..
.. we waddled across the street for our 7:45 appointment. The NCM doesn't open until eight but they let us in anyhow; we met with our Delivery Person, Bruce Robel. Bruce retired to Bowling Green from Pennsylvania and does R8C Deliveries several times a week. Great guy!
Winston's car was already in the "Corvette Nursery" but I wouldn't let him go see it; gotta prolong the joy. We hopped in one of the NCM vehicles and drove the mile to the Corvette Assembly Plant for our special tour.
The plant has scheduled public tours at 9am and 1pm, Monday through Friday -- but we had the privilege (part of the R8C option) of having a longer private tour with Bruce as our guide and saw parts of the operation where the public tour doesn't get to go. Oh, and there's a $5.00 per person fee for the public tours.
It was Winston's first time in the plant and my (about) 30th, but I enjoyed seeing parts of the process I'd never seen before. Very cool! The workers are always friendly and make it clear they appreciate Corvette buyers.
The tour took about two hours and was great fun. When it was over, we piled back into the NCM truck and headed back across the street to the National Corvette Museum:
..where this display greeted us:
We strolled down to the "Corvette Nursery" and there, in Delivery position #5 -- she was!
.. and sitting in the command seat just once:
.. it was off to the office to do paperwork:
That didn't take long and we'd alerted Corvette friends around the globe to look for us on the NCM webcams at about 11am CST. Yes, the entire thing is on webcams so people unlucky enough to have to stay home can enjoy the delivery. There'll be more webcam shots a bit later, but here's an example (thanks to Bruce Miller):
Soon it was back to the car for a complete, very thorough introduction to every single feature of the 2006 C6 Coupe. Bruce really knows his stuff:
One of the neat things about R8C is a small plaque that's attached to the driver's door frame showing that this was a Museum Delivery:
There's no key to start the C6 Corvette, just a pushbutton on the dash:
Here's how you know it's brand new:
I was supposed to blur Bruce's face (as he's in the witness-protection program) but I forgot..
Click HERE for several shots taken by Bruce Miller and Charley Robertson of the Delivery Area #5 webcam.
After going over the car completely, Bruce brought it outside to pose for the official picture:
We took a few more shots in front of the Museum:
There was just one last thing to do. We took the car back over to the plant and photographed it in front of a mural which was painted by the employees after 9/11:
..and there was time for one more posed in front of the plant main entrance:
Well, we had one terrific day -- and the 250 mile drive back to Atlanta was an absolute dream!
Finally, it was inevitable (what with the color and all) that some wag would come up with this (thanks, Ron Burch!)
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