When they handed me the helmet and fire protection gear, I knew this would not be an ordinary car ride.
I’m strapped into the passenger seat of a powerful 6-speed race-ready Corvette C5 coupe at the Bondurant School of High Performance Driving in Phoenix, Arizona, waiting for driving instructor/pro race driver Mike Speck to slam the rumbling machine into gear.
Today more than ever, the adage that “time is money” guides budget-strapped meeting and convention planners to search for ways to retool and pack more agenda into fewer days.
Mostly missing from meeting schedules are the purely “at leisure” time blocks that were common before the latest economic meltdown. Now, agendas are fine-tuned and tightened. Morning sessions start earlier; breaks are shorter. Light-fare luncheons are quick-turnaround events, and then it’s back to work until late afternoon.
Occasionally, in my search for different, affordable, and not-so-mainstream meeting destinations, I come across a gem.
This happened when I visited Mobile, Alabama on the Gulf Coast, an unexpectedly inviting, friendly and downright pretty city where residents routinely ask, “How y’all doin’?” and extend genuine southern hospitality to visitors and locals alike.
