Latest / In Wheel Time Podcast / Five Scenic Drives Around Houston; An Iconic Trophy, and first look at the Yukon!

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Five Scenic Drives Around Houston; An Iconic Trophy, and first look at the Yukon! · In Wheel Time Podcast

• 0:05
  Don Armstrong: All right.
• 0:06
  Don Armstrong: Time enough for driving destinations.
• 0:07
  Don Armstrong: Mr.
• 0:08
  Don Armstrong: Mars has five scenic cruises around Houston.
• 0:10
  Don Armstrong: We didn't know there was one, but I guess we're going to find out.
• 0:13
  Mike Marrs: Okay, Jeff.
• 0:15
  Mike Marrs: So there's five places.
• 0:17
  Mike Marrs: You know, when we talk about trying to go around Houston and the Houston area, now the Houston area is a pretty big place.
• 0:22
  Mike Marrs: And so five of them were kind of hard to find, but we found them.
• 0:27
  Mike Marrs: So one of them is the Blue Water Highway Coastal Drive.
• 0:30
  Mike Marrs: Now, this is a runs uh coast to Houston.
• 0:33
  Mike Marrs: You go down towards Galveston and it runs between Galveston and Surfside Beach, actually along the coast.
• 0:39
  Mike Marrs: Now you see the beaches, you see the marshes, you see a lot of fishing communities, and you so you get a lot of wide open views along the coast, like you would expect to see.
• 0:49
  Mike Marrs: Now you of course you can get up and go early morning and catch the sunrise or stay late and catch the sunset.
• 0:54
  Mike Marrs: So it's it's pretty nice, relaxing escape drive.
• 0:58
  Mike Marrs: Uh even City Hall here depicted here is is on pilings and uh stuff.
• 1:05
  Mike Marrs: The pier in Galveston where you can go and play and have lots of fun with the kids.
• 1:09
  Mike Marrs: Now the other thing that we wanted to talk about is FM 149 that goes up through Sam Houston National Forest.
• 1:16
  Mike Marrs: Now, there's it's kind of a drive, it goes in between the trees.
• 1:22
  Mike Marrs: There's actually three counties that this route goes across.
• 1:25
  Mike Marrs: And so you get in, you go up through New Waverly, and you go up through Montgomery in the spring and fall, you're gonna get all the colorful uh leaves in the spring, and the weather changes, and you're gonna get the wildlife sightings that are year-round, you're gonna see uh small animals, and you're not gonna see a whole lot of city traffic because a lot of people to go out on these back roads, they don't want to see that, and so you're looking for fresh air and getting away from the traffic.
• 1:50
  Mike Marrs: The other one that a lot of people are a little more familiar with is the Bolivar Peninsula ferry route.
• 1:56
  Mike Marrs: Now, this is a drive across the Bolivar Peninsula, so you can start either on Galveston or you can start up towards Beaumont or actually uh Highland.
• 2:06
  Mike Marrs: And you get on the ferry, it's a free ferry ride that goes across from Port Bolivar to Galveston or vice versa.
• 2:13
  Mike Marrs: And if you're starting in Galveston, you get on the ferry, you go across, it's about a 30-minute ride.
• 2:18
  Mike Marrs: You can see dolphins depending on the weather.
• 2:20
  Mike Marrs: You see the bay.
• 2:21
  Mike Marrs: Sometimes you get caught out there waiting on the ship to go up the ship channel into the port of Houston.
• 2:27
  Mike Marrs: But once you get over on the Bolivar Peninsula, you've got uh a lot of scenic area there.
• 2:33
  Mike Marrs: You've got a fort that was part of goes all the way back to World War I, part of the fortification there when they thought we were going to get invaded.
• 2:40
  Mike Marrs: And uh you can tour that, but you can also go up a little bit further, you can actually drive on this beach.
• 2:45
  Mike Marrs: It's it's considered highway one.
• 2:48
  Mike Marrs: There are road restrictions, there's a speed limit and everything else, but you can drive on it.
• 2:52
  Mike Marrs: Just be careful of the soft sand and don't get stuck.
• 2:56
  Mike Marrs: Then, whenever you go from there, you go on up to the Texas Independence Trail towards Washington on the Brazos.
• 3:02
  Mike Marrs: Now, this is one of six trails that are actually built that was created, uh, not only declared because of the independence of you know, Texas independence in 1836, but because of the World's Fair in 68, the Heritage Society built these different trails that kind of came into the World's Fair, and now they've kept them up.
• 3:24
  Mike Marrs: And so this kind of goes up through the farmlands, you got Blue Bonnet Fields in spring, and you got go up through Brenham and Chapel Hill, the historic homes, antique shops.
• 3:32
  Mike Marrs: There's a lot of things to go up and see up there through the springtime part of uh the seasons.
• 3:38
  Mike Marrs: Now, from there, you can actually take the San Jacinto River and Lake Houston loop.
• 3:44
  Mike Marrs: Now, a lot of people in Houston are gonna be a little more familiar with this.
• 3:48
  Mike Marrs: I was aware of Lake Houston, and I've crossed that bridge that goes across it several times, but I wasn't aware of exactly how big it is as we've kind of got it depicted here.
• 3:57
  Mike Marrs: So if you're gonna try and go running through this, you're gonna cross over the San Gacino River that feeds down from Gal uh Conroe, and uh you're gonna pass through Umbel, Hoffman, Crosby.
• 4:07
  Mike Marrs: You got lots of water views, lots of little towns.
• 4:10
  Mike Marrs: And it's uh it's a pretty big drive to go all the way around this lake, and it's pretty scenic, but it's right outside of Houston.
• 4:17
  Mike Marrs: So that's that's five places that you can go and take you a nice scenic drive without having to go spend half a day to get there.
• 4:24
  Don Armstrong: So, what what are you gonna do next weekend to top this?
• 4:29
  Mike Marrs: Um I I I'm working.
• 4:33
  Mike Marrs: You've been speakeasy lately.
• 4:35
  Jeff Dziekan: Thinking of it.
• 4:36
  Jeff Dziekan: He's trying to put you on a spot, Mike.
• 4:38
  Mike Marrs: Well, I know he is, but I've got one for the speakeasies.
• 4:41
  Mike Marrs: I'm saving.
• 4:41
  Mike Marrs: I was saving for a little longer.
• 4:43
  Jeff Dziekan: Why would you save that?
• 4:44
  Mike Marrs: Well, I'm trying to do it.
• 4:45
  Mike Marrs: Summer's coming, trying to get some of the family things in that the family and stuff can do because you're not going to take the kids to the speakeasy very many times.
• 4:52
  Jeff Dziekan: Oh, contrary.
• 4:53
  Jeff Dziekan: Before you lose custody.
• 4:56
  Jeff Dziekan: There's that.
• 4:57
  Don Armstrong: Yeah, yeah.
• 5:04
  Don Armstrong: Time now for Jeff's Car Culture.
• 5:06
  Don Armstrong: The immortality in silver, the Borg Warner Trophy.
• 5:10
  Jeff Dziekan: The Borg Warner Trophy?
• 5:11
  Jeff Dziekan: The Borg Warner Trophy, and it's been uh it's it's been an awesome uh thing to look at.
• 5:17
  Jeff Dziekan: So here we go.
• 5:18
  Jeff Dziekan: Uh the trophy, which has been presented in the winner's circle after every race since 1936, is very large.
• 5:24
  Jeff Dziekan: It's multi-tiered and which bears the high relief sculpture and likeness of each driver that has won the race since its inception in 1911.
• 5:33
  Jeff Dziekan: Inscribed are the winner's name, the year of the victory, and the average speed.
• 5:37
  Jeff Dziekan: The information is alternated with the faces in a checkered board pattern evoking a checkered flag.
• 5:43
  Jeff Dziekan: Including on the base is a gold likeness of Tony Holman, which is the uh owner of the Indianapolis Speedway from 1945 to 1977.
• 5:51
  Jeff Dziekan: Made of sterling silver, Mike, this trophy is just under five feet four inches tall and weighs 153 pounds.
• 5:58
  Jeff Dziekan: The trophy itself is hollow and the dome-shaped top is removable.
• 6:02
  Jeff Dziekan: There's a bunch of stories about kids in the trophy before that, so look online for that.
• 6:07
  Jeff Dziekan: From 1936 to 1985.
• 6:09
  Jeff Dziekan: I bet you somebody's put their weed in that.
• 6:11
  Jeff Dziekan: No, they've been drinking out of it.
• 6:12
  Jeff Dziekan: It's like the Stanley Cup thing, but that's another story for another day.
• 6:15
  Jeff Dziekan: But the trophy itself, well, the uh trophy itself, hollow dome shape for 1936.
• 6:20
  Jeff Dziekan: Okay, we said that.
• 6:21
  Jeff Dziekan: On the top of the trophy is an unclothed man waving a checkered flag because this man is depicted naked after the traditional depiction of athletes and the Greek times and the Greek art.
• 6:32
  Jeff Dziekan: Uh-huh.
• 6:32
  Jeff Dziekan: The trophy is most often photographed at an angle so that the man's arm blocks the view of the figure's genitalia.
• 6:40
  Jeff Dziekan: Does he have that?
• 6:41
  Jeff Dziekan: Genitalia.
• 6:42
  Jeff Dziekan: He's got that.
• 6:44
  Jeff Dziekan: Oh my god.
• 6:44
  Jeff Dziekan: Okay.
• 6:45
  Jeff Dziekan: I had no clue.
• 6:46
  Jeff Dziekan: Well, there goes the winner mobile.
• 6:47
  Jeff Dziekan: There you go.
• 6:49
  Jeff Dziekan: This is not a stick and ball sport.
• 6:51
  Jeff Dziekan: Uh a base was added in 1986 to accommodate more winners, similar to what has been done on the Stanley Cup.
• 6:57
  Jeff Dziekan: In 1991, the trophy went through a thorough restoration in 2004.
• 7:02
  Jeff Dziekan: The first base was removed and replaced with the new, larger base to accommodate more winners, because obviously you can run out of space.
• 7:09
  Jeff Dziekan: Enough space is currently available on the trophy to hold winners through 2033.
• 7:14
  Jeff Dziekan: The actual perpetual trophy or the trophy itself is not given to the winner.
• 7:18
  Jeff Dziekan: It remains at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in the museum.
• 7:22
  Jeff Dziekan: The winnering winning drivers since 1988 have been presented with an 18-inch tall freestanding replica of the trophy sitting on a beveled square base.
• 7:32
  Jeff Dziekan: Now on the base, there's actually the image of the driver itself.
• 7:38
  Jeff Dziekan: Officially titled the Indianapolis 500 Champions Trophy, it has been effectually nicknamed the Baby Borg.
• 7:45
  Jeff Dziekan: The Baby Borg is typically presented the following January at the Speedway Reception or sometimes at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, near the sponsor Borg Warner's Headquarters.
• 7:56
  Jeff Dziekan: So Borg Warner's Headquarters.
• 7:57
  Jeff Dziekan: Are they still in business?
• 7:58
  Jeff Dziekan: I believe so.
• 8:00
  Jeff Dziekan: When the winners beg uh began to be added annually after 1936, uh most of the 1970 drivers were depicted wearing open-face helmets.
• 8:08
  Jeff Dziekan: Floyd Davis, who co-won in the 1941 race with Maury Rose, was depicted without a helmet, while Rose was depicted with one.
• 8:18
  Jeff Dziekan: By 1946, most were shown without their goggles.
• 8:21
  Jeff Dziekan: Now the Borg Warner Indianapolis Trophy winner awarded to Ray Keach in 1929, and that's what the first one looked like.
• 8:28
  Jeff Dziekan: So there you go.
• 8:29
  Don Armstrong: Wow, that's what the first one looked like?
• 8:30
  Don Armstrong: Doesn't look like anything that we have to do.
• 8:34
  Don Armstrong: Is the man naked with a female there?
• 8:36
  Don Armstrong: I don't know.
• 8:37
  Don Armstrong: He's got his hand back there on a derriere.
• 8:39
  Jeff Dziekan: It could be a Hyundai trophy, you never know.
• 8:41
  Don Armstrong: Oh, that's and there we have it.
• 8:46
  Jeff Dziekan: We're gonna move on.
• 8:47
  Jeff Dziekan: We're gonna move on the pork.
• 8:49
  Jeff Dziekan: All right.
• 8:59
  Don Armstrong: Timeout for this hour's car review.
• 9:01
  Don Armstrong: I had an opportunity to drive the brand new 2026 GMC UConn built in Arlington, Texas, USA.
• 9:09
  Don Armstrong: They built all of those big those big suburbans, all of that.
• 9:13
  Don Armstrong: The escalate, all that comes out of Arlington, which they just recently expanded to make it even bigger than big, which it is.
• 9:21
  Don Armstrong: So it's classified as a standard SUV body on frame or truck.
• 9:26
  Don Armstrong: Um it comes in these trim levels the elevation, the AT4, the Denali, the AT4 Ultimate, and the Denali Ultimate.
• 9:38
  Don Armstrong: It's three rows of seating, up to eight people, fifth generation introduced in 2021.
• 9:45
  Don Armstrong: Um it is really something else.
• 9:50
  Don Armstrong: I had the Yukon four-wheel drive AT4 Ultimate.
• 9:56
  Don Armstrong: Wait till you hear the price.
• 9:58
  Don Armstrong: Exterior features include great big square body, SUV-like suburban type, uh, big grille with the GMC emblem almost as big as the grille itself, slab sides with concentric wheel openings, sharp-looking rear hatch, and lighting.
• 10:16
  Don Armstrong: What I liked about it, GM has made it different than the Chevy Tahoe, which would be its counterpart.
• 10:24
  Don Armstrong: Um this is kind of like a step up from the Chevrolet line.
• 10:29
  Don Armstrong: They use better materials, uh fancier stuff.
• 10:34
  Don Armstrong: It's not at the escalade, so this kind of sits in the middle between the Chevrolet version and the Cadillac version.
• 10:42
  Don Armstrong: What could use improvement?
• 10:44
  Don Armstrong: I don't know.
• 10:45
  Don Armstrong: Uh interior highlights.
• 10:46
  Don Armstrong: Comfortable, but upscale, rugged seating surfaces.
• 10:52
  Don Armstrong: Huge vertical infotainment screen, kind of you see it right there.
• 10:56
  Don Armstrong: Yeah, kind of uh a Tesla type lookout.
• 11:00
  Don Armstrong: Oh uh dash well laid out with ginormous center console.
• 11:05
  Don Armstrong: That's the center console, screens for the second row passengers, and a center screen in the second row for the AC controls.
• 11:14
  Don Armstrong: So if you don't like the way mom and dad has got the AC set, you can sit back there and fiddle with it, turn on the heat throughout the cabin and burn them up.
• 11:24
  Don Armstrong: Cargo.
• 11:26
  Don Armstrong: Uh well, it's huge back there in the back, uh, with the third row down, obviously with the third row up, not as big.
• 11:33
  Don Armstrong: What I liked about it, the overall, overall cowboy luxe treatment that this thing gets.
• 11:40
  Don Armstrong: What could use improvement?
• 11:41
  Don Armstrong: Absolutely nothing on the interior.
• 11:43
  Don Armstrong: I wouldn't touch it.
• 11:44
  Don Armstrong: They did good.
• 11:45
  Don Armstrong: I like the double stitching.
• 11:46
  Don Armstrong: I do too.
• 11:48
  Don Armstrong: Everything about it is just super.
• 11:50
  Don Armstrong: 6.2 liter EcoTec 3 V8 engine, turns out 420 horsepower, 460 pound feet of torque on a 10-speed automatic transmission.
• 12:01
  Don Armstrong: Uh tow rating up to four tons.
• 12:04
  Don Armstrong: Wow.
• 12:04
  Don Armstrong: That's 8,000 pounds if you're not doing the math right.
• 12:08
  Don Armstrong: Um now mileage 14 city, 18 highway for combined to 16.
• 12:14
  Don Armstrong: I busted the seams at 17.8 miles per gallon over 411.9 miles.
• 12:21
  Don Armstrong: What I liked about it?
• 12:23
  Don Armstrong: The plenty of smooth V8 power.
• 12:26
  Don Armstrong: They ain't nothing like a naturally aspirated V8 engine, in my opinion.
• 12:32
  Don Armstrong: Uh, what could use improvement?
• 12:34
  Don Armstrong: Offer a hybrid, which I'm sure that they probably will ultimately.
• 12:37
  Don Armstrong: Ride and handling, air ride suspension with magnetic shocks.
• 12:41
  Don Armstrong: Awesome.
• 12:42
  Don Armstrong: What could use improvement?
• 12:44
  Don Armstrong: Nothing here either.
• 12:45
  Don Armstrong: This thing rides like a limousine.
• 12:47
  Don Armstrong: Okay, let's get down to the numbers, shall we?
• 12:50
  Jeff Dziekan: Shall we?
• 12:50
  Don Armstrong: Base trim price,$97,900.
• 12:55
  Don Armstrong: That's base trim.
• 12:57
  Don Armstrong: Price as tested$103,190.
• 13:02
  Don Armstrong: I was gonna go$102.
• 13:03
  Don Armstrong: It's just a song.
• 13:05
  Don Armstrong: Just sold for$102.
• 13:06
  Don Armstrong: Now, the base model price, if you could find one out there, the entry level price of this is basically$70,000,$69.6.
• 13:16
  Don Armstrong: Okay, so here are the competitors.
• 13:17
  Don Armstrong: If you want to call it a competitor, it's just at a different level because it's a Chevy, the Chevy Tahoe starts at$60,700.
• 13:25
  Don Armstrong: The Ford Expedition, I was surprised at this.
• 13:28
  Don Armstrong: $577 is where it starts off.
• 13:31
  Don Armstrong: And the Kia Carnival, which I had recently, it starts at$37,390.
• 13:37
  Don Armstrong: Well, how can you compare the two?
• 13:38
  Don Armstrong: Size.
• 13:39
  Mike Marrs: Yeah.
• 13:40
  Don Armstrong: Size.
• 13:40
  Don Armstrong: That's that's where it compares.
• 13:41
  Don Armstrong: What were you gonna say, Mike?
• 13:42
  Mike Marrs: That's what I was gonna ask.
• 13:44
  Mike Marrs: Is that the same size?
• 13:45
  Don Armstrong: It is.
• 13:46
  Don Armstrong: It's called a standard SUV.
• 13:48
  Don Armstrong: If you remember correctly, I mentioned that in the review of the Carnival that it is classified as a standard SUV, which this is as well.
• 13:57
  Don Armstrong: All right, next week I'm gonna review the Land Rover Range Rover.
• 14:01
  Don Armstrong: All right.
• 14:02
  Don Armstrong: I told you in the tease at the beginning of the show that we had a series of six-figure vehicles that we got to drive, and uh next week we'll review the Land Rover Range Rover.
• 14:11
  Don Armstrong: I think that you'll appreciate it.
• 14:12
  Don Armstrong: I know I appreciated them letting me borrow it for a week to test drive it.
• 14:17
  Don Armstrong: Um It's different.
• 14:19
  Don Armstrong: It's different than this, it's different than the Escalade.
• 14:22
  Don Armstrong: I mean, it's very English.
• 14:25
  Don Armstrong: I say European.
• 14:26
  Don Armstrong: Yeah, it's very English, and it maintains that dignity.
• 14:31
  Don Armstrong: I was gonna say Where's my gin and tonic?
• 14:34
  Don Armstrong: You don't have any tonic blasphemy.
• 14:38
  Don Armstrong: Just not a shiple.
• 14:39
  Mike Marrs: You mentioned the differences between the Chevrolet and the GMC.
• 14:42
  Mike Marrs: You know, unfortunately, I'm old enough to remember when the GMC was the work truck level.
• 14:47
  Mike Marrs: That was kind of like this is the working man's truck.
• 14:50
  Mike Marrs: He moved up to the Chevrolet, and now it's kind of GMC is now a little bit more luxury than Chevrolet.
• 14:56
  Don Armstrong: And so since Mike's gonna talk about age, Mike just had a birthday.
• 15:00
  Don Armstrong: He's turning 87 now.
• 15:03
  Don Armstrong: So we could wish him a big thing.
• 15:05
  Mike Marrs: Thank you very much.
• 15:05
  Don Armstrong: Well, hey, if you'd like to get in touch with us, send us an email.
• 15:08
  Don Armstrong: The address here is info at inwheeltime.com.
• 15:12
  Don Armstrong: We are back after this.