In the spring of 2015, Tom Cotter
of “Cobra in the Barn” fame, ap-
proached with the question of whether
I thought a GT350 Tour similar to his
Cobra Tours would be of interest to
folks and would I consider participat-
ing. My response was positive, and
soon invitations were in the mail. Par-
ticipants from nine states responded.
Tom had used the Snowbird
Mountain Lodge in Robbinsville,
North Carolina previously as a start-
ing point for Cobra tours and selected
this location as the headquarters for
the GT350 50th Anniversary Tour.
There is a western point of North Car-
olina that projects under the slant of
eastern Tennessee, above the South
Carolina and Georgia borders. This
point lies just below the Great Smoky
Mountain National Park in the moun-
tain range and contains mile-high
peaks and some very curvy, rolling
roads; just what GT350s and Cobras
love. It was a perfect tour location. The
Snowbird Mountain Lodge provided a
beautiful rustic setting with lots of
wood and stone as well as an out-
standing view of the Smoky Moun-
tains.
I usually plan to drive my ‘66
GT350 to events, but once I discovered
it would be a 700-mile drive just to get
there, and with other considerations, I
decided to ship my car to a friend’s
house in Louden, Tennessee. It was
southwest of Knoxville where Joanne
and I would fly into. This ended up
being a bit of a logistics problem, be-
cause auto shippers don’t run on a
schedule like a bus, and they can’t load
and unload just anywhere. By giving
them a large pickup window, the car
got there in time for us to head for the
Snowbird and get ready to tour.
While picking the car up, I met up
with a fraternity brother in the area
who I had not seen for sixty years. I
found that , for a period of time, he had
lived next door to the famous Don Sul-
livan (Sully), a good friend of Henry
Ford, who designed the GT350 Hi-
Riser intake manifold. He had a few
good Sully stories.
Sunday we pulled out of Loudon
and drove the 75 miles to the Snow-
bird over the Cherohala Skyway,
which rises to 5,400 ft. and were re-
warded with a preview of the area’s
stunning fall colors. Upon arriving, we
met the Tour participants, received
our “goody” bag with jacket, souvenirs
and Tour roundels for the side of our
car with our Shelby serial number on
it. Everyone found a gas station then
we enjoyed a wonderful dinner at the
Lodge, where breakfast times and
starting directions for Monday’s drive
were provided.
Fourteen cars and crews were as-
sembled for the Tour, including 1965,
1966 and 1967 GT350s, as well as
writer Steven Cole Smith with a Ford-
supplied 2016 GT350. He was prepar-
ing a story for
Automobile magazine
.
One of the 1967s was Woody
Woodruff’s very early car which had
the auxiliary brake and turn signal
lights on the upper quarter vents.
That was a good idea before its time
but the California DOT vetoed its use.
The SHELBY AMERICAN
Winter 2016 37
– Chuck Cantwell
A GT350 Tour through parts of North Carolina, Tennessee and Georgia