The Caddy starts bouncing higher and higher as we hit pavement with undulations that match the natural frequency of the Caddy's blown suspension. The Boss-Hogg-cum-pogo-stick slams into the bump stops and then becomes airborne repeatedly as Jean screams "Slow down!" We're doing 42 mph. -JC
Asheville is ours just as night is falling. Jubilant, we stop for gas before we check in. There's a car show in town, and we race off for the last group Elvis shot we need. The Brits have beaten us! They are the worst-looking Elvises I've ever seen. A group of local matrons agrees, but they have now unfortunately latched on to Jason and Sam, and I can't seem to pry them loose.
"Those are two of the finest-looking men we've ever seen," they keep cooing. Yikes!
Meanwhile, I have my own problems. The group shot is turning into a group grope. One old geezer is patting my ass while another one is latched onto my waist rather tightly. Did I say we're in our Elvis costumes? The women are draped on Jason and Sam and suddenly this photo session has become a delicate exercise in extricating ourselves, as the theme song from Deliverance twangs away in my head. -JJ
At dinner, I state my intent to avoid the 318 turns of U.S. 129 - the infamous Tail of the Dragon - tomorrow. If the Caddy's double-stretch, 160-plus-inch wheelbase doesn't get it high-centered over a rise, the fuselage will break in half around a corner. Felix, one of the members of Team UggTruck, having downed three margaritas, musters the courage to inform me that the transmission didn't drop itself into first gear at those two red lights in Baltimore yesterday - he bumped us from behind with his van. I never saw him, of course. You'd need mirrors for that. -JC
DAY 3
Asheville, North Carolina, to Gadsden, Alabama
Team UggTruck, our angels in the van, have a crack in their oil pan. It's only right that we stay in the hotel lot to help. Besides, we don't have a choice; our fuel pump is shot. We replace it while the attentive crowd watches. Then we all watch them. The crazy chick from Team UggTruck turns out to be their mechanic. She J-B Welds the pan while we pick up breakfast at the Waffle House across the street. -JJ
As the morning wears on, cars limp out of the parking lot - cars that didn't make the start on time, cars that had to be repaired, cars that are just now arriving from yesterday's journey and are a whole day late. One team has lost the center support bearing from its drive-shaft and is wandering around looking for a ride. Another team, in a red Renault Encore, is doing endless 10-mph, leaky-exhaust-filled laps of the parking lot, trying in vain to make their brake system behave. Shouts out the back window of the Renault after every lap: "Whee! I wanna go again!"
While we're sitting in the parking lot, waiting for the UggTruck team to finish fixing their oil pan, Jason decides that we need a song for our entry to New Orleans. He cues up his entire Bee Gees stash on his iPod and, while we're all sweating in the hundred-degree heat, proceeds to do the Electric Slide over and over in the deserted parking lot. -SS
The J-B Weld is almost dry when our handheld nav system informs me that we're one mile away from the country's largest home. Seven people pile into the limo for a field trip to the Biltmore, and as I walk toward the driver's door, I notice that the center section (you know, the section without a frame) is sagging visibly. I get in gently and suggest that everyone don protective eyewear because the side windows are about to blow out. I'm not willing to go faster than 30 mph on the interstate, because the chassis is so bowed that the driveshaft is making nasty ratcheting noises.
We sing songs to drown out the noise. As we scrape around a corner in a neighborhood of dilapidated houses, our dimwitted Harman Kardon navigation system flashes "Biltmore Estate and Winery" on its screen and happily proclaims, "You have arrived at your destination!" We suspect that the device has a sophisticated sensor that calculates the value of the car in which it's installed and has determined that we have no business at the real Biltmore Estate, nine unattainable miles away. -JC