Fall Color Run 2017
Suburban Corvettes of Minnesota
37th Annual Fall Color Run
WOW! What another great Fall Color run weekend!
We left Mallards Restaurant on Friday with 50 cars after having lunch and handing out pre-registered packets. It was a beautiful cruise to Pepin, WI where we made a quick stop at the Pickle Factory before heading to LaCrosse.
The Friday night Tailgate party theme was lots of fun! GiGi and the staff did a great job decorating the rooms. Many club members embraced the theme sporting their favorite team’s attire. 273 people enjoyed the Tailgate themed buffet with pulled pork sandwiches, pigs in a blanket, meat balls, assorted meat, cheese and vegie trays. The band “Double Take” kept the dance floor full until the very end of the evening.
Sargent Berg of the Onalaska Police led 189 Corvettes out of the park at 10 AM sharp. The morning cruise went smoothly in spite of some rain which held off until we had left the park. The colors this year were the best that we have had in years!
Our lunch stop at the Phoenix Center in Richland Center went very smoothly – we had several people comment on how surprised they were that 299 people were able to get food so quickly with plenty of room to sit down and enjoy their meal of BBQ Chicken sandwiches, potato salad, baked beans, and a cookie for dessert.
We were back on the road at 1:30 and the afternoon cruise offered a different route with some great new roads perfect for Corvette driving and Mother Nature dressed them in some great fall colors in spite of the drizzle.
We stopped at Nick’s bar at the end of the route. Jason once again sold FCR t-shirts and also gave the club the balance of them to continue to sell for Spina Bifida. If you are interested – we have large and X-large sizes available for $10.
The Wisconsin room was beautifully decorated for the banquet Saturday evening where 178 people enjoyed the dinner. We were entertained by Travis of “Karaoke Plus”, the singing DJ. He was terrific and a favorite every year.
The Spina Bifida Raffle and Silent Auction had another great year raising $3,880. The auction items were unique including: A Corvette Racing poster signed by all four drivers, courtesy of Eric Kehle, two fenders from Corvette racing, 50th Anniversary Ltd. Ed. Model donated by Joan & Terry Wigginton, Dick Guldstran’s 1st, 427 Corvette model donated by Paula & Phil Brunt, Minnesota Wild Tickets donated by Pat & Jim Bodin, RCA 7” Voyage tablet donated by Jan & Shawn Hanna and several other items from other club members.
The raffle drawing included Gift cards from Evon & Mike Miller, Barb & Greg Stattman, and Rich Volden. Two Fall Color Run certificates, a driving school certificate, and many more contributions from club members and some local merchants that Gigi arranged on our behalf.
On Sunday morning we cruised over to the Cedar Creek Country Club where 160 people enjoyed a terrific brunch. This and much more took place over 48 hours!
Thanks again to Barb & Roger Dahlquist for taking event pictures. Everyone enjoys reviewing the pictures of all the Corvettes and the events of the day – which can be found on the club website.
We want to take this opportunity to again say thank you to all the volunteers that make this event a success each year – we couldn’t do it without you!!
We received several very nice letters and dozens of positive comments from people who enjoyed the weekend in spite of the weather. We wanted to share the comments from one letter in particular: “I wanted to thank you and your club, the City of LaCrosse, the volunteers, and local police departments for a great time. I have been going to different Corvette events for about 18 years and have never attended this particular event. I found it to be extremely well organized, well planned and easy to get any information that I needed to plan my trip, and best of all FRIENDLY. It was a perfect schedule of events, beautiful roads, perfectly spaced stops, great food and wonderful camaraderie amongst people that I have seen at other events, and new friends I met this weekend”. We hope you all felt that way but are always open to your suggestions to improve the event. Please send your comments to Terry & Joan Wigginton.