Vacation Day 5, Charlotte, NC

After we saw the Wright Memorial, we headed for Charlotte.  The drive was about 3 hours and really scenic.  We crossed several bridges.  Bridges connect mainland NC to the Outerbank string of islands.  After the bridges we drove through about an hour of what I would consider marshland.  Every now and then we would cross another long bridge, but most of the road wondered through a lot of nature.  I think at one point we were on a two lane road named Crocodile Hwy, we also saw a couple of signs that warned against feeding bears from your car. 

 

We arrived in Moresville and grabbed dinner.  Day 5 consisted of seeing Charlotte Motor Speedway and the NASCAR Hall of Fame. 

I had booked the "Over the Wall" tour package, which gets you into a couple extra areas at the track.   

 

A view from the box

 

Waiting for our ride, outside the track

Our van, we loaded the kids car seats inside and buckled in for our tour. 

 

This was in the media center.  Drivers will come here and talk to the media.  The rest of the room consisted of long tables with tons of outlets for all the media to hook up their laptops.  Each row of tables had two tv suspended from the ceiling.  One tv showed the race as broadcasted, the other tv would be spitting out facts or insider statistics

They had a lot of neat and rare photos inside the media room. 

 

This was winners circle

 

This is the PRN broadcast booth.  I think Rob was enamored with the recording set up

 

This is the Memeber's only restaurant.  It is open to the public for lunch but dinner is reservation only for members.  During a race members can sit at a window side table for 1 hour alotments, then they are moved to a different table.  A scene from Talladega Nights was filmed there. 

Charlotte Motor Speedway also has the biggest outdoor HD tv screen.  It was huge!  I could spew random facts about the whole tour, pretty interesting.  I think the kids enjoyed driving fast in the van, and going on the embankment.  I think this speedway has 29 degrees embankment, and the van would start to flip at 33!

 

Up next our trip to the NASCAR Hall of Fame...