Chrysler 300 Club International
Fall Meet in Newport, RI


September, 2018

Emails from the meet

Dave Dumais writes:
Di and I arrived safely around 4:45 this evening. Traffic was testy and drivers were fair to selfish. That first ramp by the Hotel was flooded at the bottom. I think it may have affected the lube in the clutch tube, and other places which have not seen water in years. Hope everyone had a safe trip.
Don and Pat Cole write:
Michael, Pat and I want to say for a rookie you put on a great meet! Everything was well planned out well with great directions, places to dine and interesting choices of destinations. After all you are the new generation of the 300 Club. Thanks again.
Brian and Kathy Frank write:
We want to thank Mike Falcone for a terrific meet in Rhode Island. Kathy and I had a great time. Lots of history with the tour of Fort Adams and the Breakers Vanderbilt mansion. Also, lots of good times with friends, old and new, talking cars and whatever.
The Newport Auto Museum was fantastic as well. Got to see some very unique cars up close and drive a 1969 Hemi Daytona on the Daytona race track on the simulator. Thank you Mike and those that helped you out.
Noel Hastalis writes:
A huge Thanks! to Mike Falcone for organizing and hosting a wonderful meet in Newport this past week! Our first-time meet attendees, along with Club veterans had plenty of activities to enjoy - Monday's narrated Trolley Tour of historic Newport and its 'Cottages' followed by a tour of The Breakers - 70 room summer estate of Cornelius Vanderbilt. Tuesday's tour of the expansive Fort Adams, followed by a cruise to Beavertail State Park, on a beautiful sunny day. And Wednesday's Car Show in the parking lot of the Newport Car Museum - unfortunately dampened by persistent heavy drizzle and rain, but indoors offered a beautifully presented collection, the layout and computer-generated lighting of which is seldom seen. Many of us tested our skills on the driving simulators - all I can say is that it's a good thing we drive our Letter Cars better than we drove our race cars on those simulators! Check it out at www.newportcarmuseum.org and on Facebook. And the food quality at our host hotel was great - far better than your typical hotel restaurant. Our Hospitality Room was always open, and our preferred meeting room when the rain was falling on our cars out in the parking lot. I hope all our first time attendees had a great time, and will reach out to us with questions on their Letter Cars, either on our list server, or individually.
I saw Dave Dumais' email comment about the flooded ramp to the bridge by our hotel. John Begian and I headed out shortly before Dave and Diane, and the heavens let loose as we started driving on the Newport Bridge, so we just beat that flooding, but it sure didn't make our drive any less challenging in John's G and my F. Heading westbound to Michigan for John, and Illinois for me, we experienced on and off sometimes heavy rain all the way through central Pennsylvania. My car developed an engine 'miss' as we had headed toward Newport from Cooperstown on Sunday, so John looked in the distributor after our late lunch yesterday in western PA - reset the points and tightened a couple connections. In the middle of doing this, a brief but heavy rain hit, so down went our hoods and trunk lids, up went our windows, as we sat in our cars and waited - we would have been better dressed in swimming trunks. Thanks to John's magic touch, the F ran like new again, all the way back home - 19 hours door-to-door including stops - rolled into my driveway at 12:30 last night - a fun 2,000+ mile round trip that I would repeat next week.
Pete Fitch writes:
Thank you to Mike Falcone and all the others who helped him throw a great meet, the weather notwithstanding. Anne and I had a wonderful time for the entire four days. The museum, especially, was a great surprise and made the rainy day a lot brighter. Thanks again.
Martha and Mick Kreszock write:
Wow, Mike, it was a wonderful meet ... great hotel with excellent staff, restaurant, and bar; great activities; beautiful city; and much history. The trolley tour made for easy sightseeing without worrying about maneuvering big letter cars on narrow streets, and of course our groups turned the trolley rides into fun little mini-parties. Fun to re-visit several places from Don’s meet at Newport sixteen years ago (wow, that long!). Much new to see at Fort Adams, also the incredibly beautiful cars and the hospitality of the Buermans at the Newport Car Museum. And can’t forget the beauty and power of waves crashing on the rocks at the Lighthouse at Beavertail State Park (google it folks, it’s amazing). And all of this with great 300’s and great friends! Well planned and well done! Thanks again, Mike!
Jean-Yves and Jacinthe Chouinard write:
Mike, this was a fantastic meet! Thank you for all the effort you put into getting this meet together! Really! We enjoyed it thorougly! Wonderfull to see good friends from the Club again and make new ones too! I hope everybody had a good trip back, ours was fine, just a broken hood release handle from trying to check the oil in the F...
Bill Elder writes:
Mike:
All of the thanks should be to you. You organized a great meet and we really enjoyed ourselves! Well done.
Bonnie and Rip Ripley write:
Thank you, Mike for hosting and organizing such an awesome meet. We really enjoyed seeing you and all the other members who attended.
The tour, the cruise and the Newport Car Museum were terrific.
Charlie Valentine and Tony Rinaldi write:
We are now in Lake George with Michael Falcone enjoying the Hemmings Saturday Show. Sunday’s Concours will have the Letter Cars as one of their featured Marque. There will be 6 cars representing the Marque and our Club. C-300 Dan Roy, 300-C Rob Kern, 300-D Dan Roy, 300-F My Car, 300-G Tom White, 300-G Michael Falcone.
We all owe Michael many thanks for a wonderful job well done. 16 years ago, I went to our Newport RI Meet hosted by Don Verity. I would not miss an opportunity to revisit Newport with my 300. As always, we go to these Meets for the cars and we stay for the people.
Michael’s idea to tour Newport with trolleys was brilliant. Our cars were safely back in the hotel. We didn’t have to worry about parking. The guides narrated while he drove past the beautiful town and historic mansions and Churches. We will take photos at the Sunday Concours and make them available to be included with the write up for the Fall Meet.
John & Jupei Hannon write:
I strongly echo all these accolades about your Fantastic Meet! You made it all look so easy! You smiled the entire time and we loved each and every minute of it! GREAT JOB!! Hearty thanks again to you and all who made this happen!
Don and Judith Warnaar write:
We just got home last night after some other touring. Thank you for the wonderful job you did in hosting the Meet. You attended to every detail and seemed to be present everywhere taking care of all who attended. You were truly a hands on host.
The hotel couldn't have been better. Your plans included having a good parking area, the hospitality room right next to the elevator, and having the large room for the meetings, the breakfast, and the banquet. No travel was needed for those activities. Plus the hotel had a good restaurant which was very convenient. The good food was also part of the banquet. The buffet satisfied everyone's taste.
The activities were within good travel distance. The trolley tour was informative and included the stop at The Breakers which kept our 300s safely at the hotel. Fort Adams was most interesting and the car show was next to the Newport Car Museum which would have been worth a separate trip by itself. What a wonderful display of the cars.
Thank you again for organizing and hosting a fabulous meet. Your personal attention to each detail was appreciated by us and surely by all who attended.
Don Verity writes:
Congratulations to Mike Falcone for putting on another great family reunion. Everything went smoothly, except for the weather. I look forward to Mike hosting many more meets in the future.
Joe and Meg Williams write:
I also want to thank Mike for the the great job of organizing the meet. I thought the whole thing went flawlessly. Although we could have done with less rain on show day.
For those of you that shared our hurricane fears, our house did fine with no damage. We were finally able to get back in yesterday. We have power and just got our internet connection restored. A lot of our neighbors were flooded out. My brother had flooding in the first 2 levels of his house and 2 trees fell on it cause water damage on the third level.
Mark Obermann writes:
I wanted to add our thanks to Mike and the support team for the caliber of the Meet and the schedule of activities. Mike was so relaxed, yet completely involved and made a difficult task look easy. That attitude rubbed off on those who attended the Meet.
We went on to Lake George via memorable stops in NH and VT to attend the Hemmings Concours. The exhibited 300s looked sensational on the show field and gave another opportunity to chat with our Letter Car friends. Mike's thoughtful scheduling of our Meet gave us the option to do this. We were happily surprised to find the Jazz on the Lake festival was a two block walk away from the Concours hotel and featured some outstanding talent in a great setting. Oh, and we happened upon the large British Invasion car event in Stowe, VT while we were staying there. Another bonus.
Thinking of all the folks affected by the hurricane. The impending storm event certainly couldn't have made the Meet any easier.
Rob Kern writes:
Kudos to Mike Falcone for hosting a marvelous meet in Newport! Everything was well planned, great attention to detail, fabulous time spent with club members on trolleys, in parking lot, at hospitality suite, at Fort Adams, at our car show and the Newport Car Museum and a super banquet! The host hotel was perfect. Even the weather proved that our club can have a swell time indoors while it rains! No dampening of spirit! It was also great to go for follow-on with Mike, Tony Rinaldi, Bill and Marylyn Allen, the Roys, and the Obermanns to Lake George and the Hemings Concours D’Elegance and festivities. Congratulations to Tony Rinaldi, Michael Falcone, and Tom White for winning awards at the concours with their gorgeous 300s! See you in Dallas!