Appalachian Adventure lived up to its reputation as the premier annual event for the Appalachian Region with this year’s four-day extravaganza in Blowing Rock, North Carolina. 122 people with 56 Porsches gathered the evening of Thursday, September 9, 2021 and departed Sunday, September 12, 2021. Nine PCA regions were represented with members from seven states.
The Appalachian Adventure multi-day, multi-event extravaganza had a full schedule of drives, socials, a Concours, technical quiz and a special reception in a private collection “Car Barn”.
The “Extravaganza” started with welcome cocktails and hors d’oeuvres in the host hotel, the Meadowbrook Inn that included egg rolls, chicken & waffles, individual shrimp & grits and fried green tomatoes. The evening social provided a chance for out-of-region participants and Appalachian Region members to meet each other in a casual social atmosphere. This has become such a regular event for the Citrus Region some of them almost seem like Appalachian Region members. Based on the number of trophies they take home every year, I am not surprised that Citrus Region members keep coming North for this event.
Friday was all about driving, with three different driving tours planned to three unique locations for lunch. The Blowing Rock base provided easy access to the Blue Ridge Parkway, one of the most spectacular driving roads in the country. Besides the beauty of the Parkway, some got to experience the tight twists and turns of US-221 near Blowing Rock, The Diamondback on NC-226A and The Devil’s Whip on NC-80. The drives provided an extravaganza of views, vistas and driving pleasure. The sun and clear, dry weather and light traffic enhanced the overall experience as the tours wound over “the best driving roads in America.”
What an extravaganza Saturday was. The day started with testing one’s Porsche knowledge with a technical/historical quiz over breakfast. The morning featured the annual Concours with a BBQ lunch, followed by an afternoon reception at the private collection “car barn” where we enjoyed drinks and dessert. An awards dinner concluded the day with Chip Perry, the former CEO of AutoTrader.com and Porsche enthusiast as the feature keynote speaker.
This year’s Historical/Technical quiz introduced a new “Quiz Master”, Dan Dazzo, to the role. It was a proctored quiz that was completed over breakfast. Twenty people took the quiz with varying degrees of success. Dan prepared for a resolution of a tie, but even with five tie-breaker questions, he couldn’t bring it down to just one winner so two winners were announced and awarded.
The Historical/Technical Quiz winners were Nort Northam from the Citrus Region with an “honorary Appalachian Region membership” since he spends the summer with our Region and John Hudson from the Musik Stadt Region in Tennessee. They were awarded with a handcrafted pen from Charlie Hickey’s studio. They each scored 20 out of 25 of the questions correctly and two of the five tiebreaker questions. It was an impressive bit of Porsche knowledge demonstrated with their quiz answers.
Concours Chair David Butler along with Charlie Hickey laid out a Concours field in tight quarters that really showed off everyone’s beautiful Porsches to maximum benefit. Since we were right downtown the event drew a lot of visitors and spectators for the event. Judging was “People’s Choice” voting for one car in each of nine classes plus “Best in Show.”
In addition to the show cars, Porsche Asheville was represented with a display of a new Taycan and a 911. Local Blowing Rock resident Chip Perry brought out an exquisite 1951 Porsche 356 and his Porsche Tractor.
Here are the winners of the Appalachian Region 2021 Appalachian Adventure Annual Concours with a photo of their car.
Porsche 1, 356, 912
The one entrant of Peter Graham’s 1968 912 was combined into Porsche 2
Porsche 2, Air-Cooled 911’s 1965-1998
Charlie Hickey, 1972 Viper Green Porsche 911T Targa
Porsche 3, 911, 1999-2011 (996 & 997)
Craig Honeycutt, 2003 Gray 911 Carrera 4S
Porsche 4, 911 2012 - Present (991 & 992)
First Place: Charles Branch, 2020 Chalk 911S Coupe (992)
Second Place: Gus Brame 2020 White 911 (992)
Porsche 5, Boxster
First Place: John Goetzman, 2016 Mahogany Metallic Boxster GTS
Second Place: Bill Price, 2014 Agate Gray Boxster S
Porsche 6, Cayman
Dave White, 2014 Guards Red Cayman
Porsche 7, 924, 944 & 928
Steve Kalmin, 1988 White 928S
Porsche 8, Macan & Panamera
Don Therien, 2018 Night Blue Macan GTS
Porsche 9, Special Interest, 718 Spyder, 911 Speedster & GT4
Allen Vogl, 2020 Chalk 718 Spyder
Special Award
Chip Perry, Porsche Tractor
All the winners were announced and presented their trophies at the Awards Banquet in the evening. A Salmon and Petit Beef Medallions buffet dinner was served with assorted cheesecakes for dessert. Appalachian Region President Don Therien acted as emcee for the evening.
The Feature Speaker was Chip Perry, the former CEO of Autotrader.com, a Porsche enthusiast, collector and student of Porsche history. Chip’s talk highlighted little known facts about the beginning of Porsche through its strong ties to the development of Volkswagen.
Chip has an extensive library of automotive books so he punctuated points of his talk with books where the reference came from. The reading list he ended up creating for students of Porsche history was all encompassing and would almost guarantee you a win in next year’s historical/technical quiz if you read each book he suggested. Guests of Chips included his friend and mechanic extraordinaire Pat Collins and friend and automotive marketer Mark Osmers.
The driving was great, the showing the cars was great and meeting new friends was great; but everyone would probably agree that the highlight of the weekend was the visit to the private collection “car barn. It was anything but a barn, as it was larger than most homes, and was exquisitely decorated with lighting that made each of the 24 Porsches, Volkswagens and assorted British cars the star of the “barn.”
Our host provided beer, wine and soda with spectacular desserts of cookies, tarts and cupcakes. The desserts were just the perfect capper to a day on the show field and our BBQ lunch.
The collection was open for two hours and every minute was enjoyed peering over every car including a workshop that is the envy of every mechanic. The best thing is that even though every car was flawless, they are regularly driven and we were even invited to sit in the cars that were special to us. Claudia and Peter Graham had just such an experience reliving the ‘60’s in a VW Microbus.
An “extravaganza” is an elaborate and spectacular entertainment or production so this year’s Appalachian Adventure certainly qualified.
Thanks to the core Appalachian Adventure planning team of Bill Price, Don Therien, Bob Hermann, John Goetzman and David Butler for making this year’s Appalachian Adventure a great event.
Of course the core team had a lot of help including:
Registration, Meals and Social events
- Bill Price
- Norma Price
- John Goetzman
- Toni Goetzman
- Dave White
- Peggy White
- Joe Watson
Concours
- David Butler
- Charlie Hickey
- Jim Moore
- Don Grainger
- Bob Disney
- Dan Dazzo
- Kevin Duffy
- Barbara Duffy
- Carl von Schummer
- Peter Graham
Historical/Technical Quiz
- Dan Dazzo
Car Barn Staging
- Jim Moore
- Bob Disney
- Nort Northam
- Bill Price
Driving Tour Leads and Sweeps
- Bob Disney
- David Raznick
- Scott Pleune
- Charlie Guidici
- Robert and Jean Larsen
- Dan Dazzo
- Phil Leftwich
- Dave White
- Don Therien
- Don Grainger
Over 30 members contributed their time and effort to make this “Extravaganza” a true extravaganza. Thank you to all of you.
Enjoy the photo gallery of the weekend’s events. Photos courtesy of John Goetzman, Bob Disney, Claudia Graham, Carl von Schummer, Jim Moore, Jean Larsen and David Linton.
Place the cursor on or below an image to pause the show.
Bob Disney made this video while walking through the concours.
Written by Jim Moore and edited by John Goetzman and David Butler.