MiataWorld II: Day Ten

by Alan J. Claffie

The vacation that was MiataWorld II is now over. We pulled out of the hotel Wednesday morning and pulled into our driveway before 6:00 PM. We're happy to report that the trip went nicely and smoothly with no mechanical failures, no speeding tickets, no fender benders, and only one conversation where I thought things might have descended into fisticuffs.

It was misting as we left in the morning but we dared to venture out top-down. This worked for maybe an hour but after driving through one too many showers the roofs had to go up. Fortunately, once we got past the fog in the higher sections of Interstate 64 heading towards Richmond the skies cleared up, the sun came out, and we made the last hundred miles traveling in style.

We have been out and about in these little roadsters for a week and a half, sometimes for half a day at a time, and I think our total top-up time was less than six hours.

My '99 covered 3,422 miles from leaving our driveway to pulling back in. Kate's Mazdaspeed MX-5 did about the same, though we didn't note her beginning mileage at the start of the trip. Her car went on some errands when we first got to Grapevine, and did the aborted Amazing Rally attempt, while mine went solo to Motorsports Ranch so it probably all balanced out.

Both cars have been emptied of luggage, snacks, and trash that accumulated over the course of the trip, but there's a monumental task of getting both cleaned up to the state they were before we left, when they were pretty near spotless with fresh washes and waxes. After six runs up and down the Gap, and a full day spent at speed or otherwise being driven hard at Texas Motor Speedway, they're both probably due for fresh oil as well. Neither used a drop of oil, coolant, or brake/clutch fluid during the trip, though I suppose I shouldn't be surprised since both are still low-mile cars (the '99 now shows just a tick over 54,000 miles while the MSM is somewhere around 37,000).

And while we have some vehicular stuff to take care of, there's also the little matter of a lawn that's badly in need of mowing, a huge stack of laundry that needs to be, well, laundered, and all the other projects around the house that have been put on hold for the last couple weeks. Not to mention we have to make amends with Captain Slow, as the poor '90 Miata has been stuck home while its two siblings were out having all sorts of fun. On the plus side, Slow got to stay in the garage, which is a rare treat for the beater of the bunch.

The other project at hand is taking care of the photos shot on the trip. We took nearly a thousand, which, if you think about it, is kinda a low number considering we are always shooting when we go to the track. But when you're a participant, rather than an observer, the emphasis is on the doing rather than the documenting so we don't have a whole lot to show of the time we were on the track on Sunday. Others were there and I'm sure they'll be putting up their own pictures in the coming days or weeks, and we'll link to them when we find them. But I've picked out about 250 of our photos to put up, and we'll have those up in the next day or two. We'll also come back here to do a more serious recap of the week once we get a chance to sit back and catch our breath.

More later.

Send Feedback Via Email

Return to Front Page