Holiday Inn Express Hotel & Suites Charlotte-Concord-I-85, Nc

The journey home began at 6AM Venice time and even with only a one hour layover in Munich we arrived in Charlotte at 6PM est time (midnight Venice time!) a very long day. We had a trendous trip and Aunt Sue and Guido were the perfect hosts and tour guides. I almost feel like going right back but that will have to wait for now probably June 2011. The weather was cold and at times rainy so some of the things you would routinely do were just not possible.

Excited and ready to leave. The forecast does not seem very promising but it will be great to see Sue &amp; Guido again. We leave Charlotte at 5:30 PM and should be in Venice at Noon (Italian time) Wednesday. I will try to send photo's as we take them as well as update this blog. I loved this when Chris and Liana used it . <br>

... our driving extravaganza and finally arrived in the first city we would be performing in, Concord, NC. This is apparently the home to Lowe's Motor Speedway. That's right NASCAR fans, we were right next to this place. I never realized just how big those tracks are. It was huge! Now, I am not a racing fan, so I had no clue where we were until I literally ended up driving next to it. I kept thinking "wow, there are a ton of hotels for some random NC city I ...

I thought that I would post this picture of me and La Poderosa just before I left for the west coast a couple month's ago. She had to be sold in LA:( What an amazing bike for 700 bucks. She got me through one of the most amazing adventures that I've had to date. As soon as I can get my computer that has all the pics on it online I will have a boat load of stuff to post from this trip.<br><br>

So I just set up this blog thingy. Computers and stuff like this are not my forte. I will try to update with some images of my travels as I get a chance. I am leaving for Istanbul, Turkey in a couple days. So i am practice packing to get things down to as little as possible. I am hoping to hitchhike ...

Sarah and Ken were waiting for us, as we deplaned in Charlotte North Carolina.They had caught a flight from Detroit to Charlotte, the meeting place for our international flight. <br><br> It seems so exciting... and odd, too. Seeing familiar faces outside the ...

... but given the amount of rain, clouds and fog we couldn't see a thing. So we took a few pictures and pretty much drove straight through the park :(<br><br>We reached our destination fairly early tonight and decided with this storm passing over us maybe a cabin would be a little better than staying inside our "tight quarters." The cabin is pretty roomy double size bed, eating area, 1/2 bath, heater and ...

WW and I drove across western NC. Got to a town called Statesville and went into J&amp;R Cigars, billed as the World's largest cigar store. They ain't lying. BIg ol' CHurchills for $3 (or less).<br><br>We camped at Lake Norman, land donated to the State of NC by the Duke Power company as long as the state let them leave their nuke there. No pics. Suprisingly nice campground.

... not. After about 10 laps it was boring to watch without the wrecks. I guess the only other thing that kept the excitement level up was the announcer was able to talk to the drivers over the loud speakers with the communication setups that they had in their cars. Bring on the crash-em-up derby. That is about the only thing that will keep my interest in races.

... of weeks to visit their daughter, then coming back to grab their trailer and head south to Florida and hopefully find another nursing contract. I came back to the trailer, did some reading and finally continued working on a slide show presentation of Katrine's Curling in Italy. All the other parents and coaches are waiting for copies of the pictures I took of the girls curling and winning University Olympic Gold. One year is coming up and I figured I should get that finished.