buckle-up

The snow is falling all across Colorado’s front ranges and the temperatures have plummeted to somewhere close to -10F. The chill winds of winter have well and truly descended on the good folks of Colorado. While skiers may be rejoicing at their windfall, so as to speak, for the rest of us it’s a time to stay close to the fireplace, consume copious amounts of soups and casseroles and perhaps the odd hot toddy. Looking through my photo albums including many pictures that have appeared on posts to this blog, I settled on the photo above as perhaps the most memorable of all photos taken during Margo and my road trips. It was featured in a post way back on August 29, 2013. The road lies between Tennessee and North Carolina and is affectionally called the Tail of the Dragon. For our European audience, think of the world famous Nordschleife, or North Loop, of the Nürburgring! But not passing through the Eiffel Mountains but America’s Smokey Mountains. No matter the location but the refere...

  OK, so let’s talk cars! After all, this Buckle-Up blog has always been about motor vehicles, road trips, car shows and our time out on track. I know, it’s been a while to dedicate a post just to cars but for Margo and me year 2020 represents a milestone. That’s right; we didn’t buy a single car all year! Mark that down as a new record for Margo and me although truth be known (and already recorded in earlier posts), we did order a new car for delivery sometime in 2022. Does that even count? Worth noting, however, was how we took the time in 2019 to reduce the number of cars from six – plus an RV and trailer – to four and this year that number will be further reduced to just three. Count them; a garage with only three cars to choose from. I seriously don’t know if I will be able to adjust to this new reality! For the past two decades, we have really had opportunities to pretty much test drive many different cars.   Some we truly did enjoy more than others even as we had ac...