"RoseGarden" - - - - - - - from - nscave

By now I realize the correct way to spell Budweiser, not Budwiser. After watching the Daytona 500 today I was glad I attended last weeks races rather than sitting there all day today with the several delays.  It was a good race though, especially the finish.

Anyway, my first attendance at a NASCAR race at Daytona International Speedway is over. It is 11 pm, time to head back to the hotel.

Down the stairs, down the ramps, with wobbly knees, it seems worse than going up. We managed to get one of the first buses back to the 40 acre parking lot. (Well it seemed that big, I don’t know the size.)

Sea of Cars

The lot is a sea of cars and it is lit up like daylight, except dark around the edges. When we came in we parked right in line with an orange flag which was also in line with the bus pick up point. Too easy! I can remember that.

Now where is that orange flag? As we scan from horizon to horizon, no orange flag. Whhaaaat? No orange flag.

We begin walking and come across an individual that is sitting under a sign that says ‘Info’. When we came in we parked by an orange flag,” we tell him, “and we can’t seem to find the flag.”

“Well yeah,” he says, “there was an orange flag here, but it broke. I reckon I don’t remember where it was.”

That’s info alright, and we walk, and walk, and walk, and… We covered that entire parking lot at least twice. No Big Blue. I press the panic alarm on my remote hoping to see lights flashing and horns blowing. Then it happened, I hear the sound of a familiar horn. I press again it stops. “That’s ours,” I say. I press again, silence. I press and press, and I hear silence, silence. Hearing horns in the distance I realize other people are doing the exact same thing.

By now I not the most pleasant person you could meet. I have never done such a fool thing in my life, never, and I have been in a lot of places.

It Looks Like This Sir

My lady friend spots a guy riding an ATV and flags him down. He turns out to be a policeman. After telling him our story, and giving a description of our vehicle, he says: “I am used to that. I will find it. You stay right here! Right here! Don’t move! I will be back, even if I don’t find it and it may take awhile, this place is big.”

Fifteen to twenty minutes later the lights of the ATV are coming down the road. He has a lady driving a golf cart with two white flags flying, following him. “I found it.” He said. “It’s way over on the other side of the field by number two. This lady will give you a drive back to your SUV.” Hmmm, that’s where I heard the horn before when I was pressing the panic alarm button. We thank him a dozen times and are on our way golf cart style.

Golf Cart With Two White Flags

The lady delivers us to our vehicle in quick time. As we were motoring along I remember us seeing the golf cart running around with the two white flags flying high, earlier in the day. No marking on the golf cart or the flags. But now I know what those two white flags mean.

“Here’s the dummies that can’t find their car!”

Tomorrow: Daytona Flea Market & Back to PCB

-=One Day At A Time=-

This work by NSCAVE is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License