On Saturday, December 10th the holiday lights road rally was held. What is that you may ask? Well every year there is a road rally held around Christmas. The road rally is held as a way to obtain donations for Toys for Tots and allows those participating to see some of the best lights in the area. It is also a time contest for bragging rights and small trophies for those who truly do well.
After check in you receive quite a few trivia questions to help pass the time and eventually your route directions and questions that relate to the houses that you will be seeing. Questions such as “How many candy canes are in the yard?” or “Who is peaking out of the igloo?” You really have to pay attention to the directions and the questions which often are out of order (they like to be tricky). The rally is timed so you have to check back in by 10pm otherwise you start getting penalized by getting points. The more points you have the worse you did. Each question incorrect is 10 points against your team that relate to the route directions and each minute late is 5 points against your team, ouch.
We love this event as we enjoy looking at holiday lights and enjoy giving to others such as Toys for Tots. You should at least have a driver and a navigator to help with the directions and bring along a clip board and working flashlights and a pen or pencil and then just enjoy the ride.
My group must be getting the hang of things as I was shocked when I heard we came in 2nd place. We only missed two questions so we had 20 points, not too bad. Then again there was a lot smaller turnout sine it was a snowy, slick night. I would say that perhaps 20-25 cars participated. In years past it was closer to 50 to 60 cars but it was a pretty snowy night. Phil Wegrzyn participated for the first time and just as we did our first year he was very pleased to find out he ended up with the most points of all of the contestants…until he learned that points were not a good thing. Great lights though and a lot of fun and it was for charity. Enjoy a small sample of pictures of some of the homes that we went past during the lights tour.
By Russ Butler