Every year, the Lane Motor Museum in Nashville, Tennessee lets several dozen enthusiasts rent one of the cars in their collection and drive it on public roads for an afternoon. What could be better than that?
In September, 2011 a bunch of my online buddies drove or flew to Nashville for the event. One came from Atlanta, one for Dallas, two from Kansas and one from Rhode Island. We had a fellow who started this ball rolling from western Canada, but family issues kept him home at the last minute.
The Lane specializes in the offbeat, the weird, the strange and flat out whacky. My group signed up for a bright orange Citroen DS fitted out as a rally car and known as La Belle Orange! At about 9 am, we were turned loose on a twisty set of back roads through the Tennessee countryside, ending up at the Jack Daniels distillery in Lynchburg where we had a sumptuous lunch. Then we switched drivers and motored back home over another selection of country roads to the museum, where we were invited to roam the lower level that the regular patrons don’t see. Here are all the cars that are undergoing refurbishment and restoration and may be added to the collection someday.
It was a rather long day that started at 7 am and did not end until after 10 pm when we got back from a delightful banquet hosted by the museum staff at a local restaurant.
Kudos to Jeff Lane and his organization for putting on such a well run and fun event. If you’re interested, visit the museum website to see what they have planned for their next adventure.
For photos of the museum and our rally adventure, please visit this link:Â Lane Motor Museum. Be sure to browse all the sub-folders as well to see the cars on display, their micro car and cycle collections and the dozens of cars waiting in the basement to be restored and added to the public viewing area.
The event was sponsored by Hagerty Insurance, which specializes in special interest cars. I wrote and article about my experience, which is complete with some video shot from inside the car along the rally route. Please click this link to access the article, photos and video on the Hagerty website.
Rhode Trips 