Charlotte Auto Show

One of six Oscar Meyer Wienermobiles that tour the country! They hire teams of new college grads every year to hit the road and drive this puppy and promote Oscar Meyer! Sounds like a great job!

Another big advantage of being retired, is being able to go do fun car stuff Monday-Friday, not just on the weekends! Did you know that there are tons of people out in the world doing things EVERY DAY without going to work? Wow! I highly recommend it! Today we drove up to Charlotte, hopped on the light rail train to downtown, and got off at the Convention Center for the Auto Show! Let's go!

Toyota Supra, not sure if it's the 4 or 6 cylinder, but it's a bit of a scrunch to get down into this thing. I bumped my head on the roof, so maybe you should wear a helmet before driving!

Toyota Tacoma, the "Taco" remains a very popular truck. Here we see it in some kind of orange, in front of the Ford display with one of their trucks in orange!

BMW was featuring their electric cars, here's the i5. There was a crew of people around this car with yellow towels, turns out the roof was leaking right on this car! 

Another BMW electric, the i7 is all new, very plush inside, and very expensive. Six figures all day. There will be test drives of electric cars the rest of the weekend, but since this was the first day of the show, there were no test drives. 

I think this was part of a display from some North Carolina group that promotes solar and other power solutions. It's a Toyota Prius cut-away so you can see where the electric batteries are hiding. Or, feel free to make up your own story about a wicked car crash!

Here's the new Lexus all electric RZ450e. 
One highlight of hitting the first day of the car show was that it was NOT crowded at all. I've been to other shows where there are so many people and kids that you couldn't get near some of the cars, much less sit inside them to check it out. No issues today!

Live from inside the Wienermobile! You're not going to get such high-quality entertainment on every car blog!

Ford Maverick, still in high demand. This one is the Ecoboost gas engine. They had a second Maverick on display too, so that was fun to see. 

There were three Porsche models on display, here's the all-electric Taycan GTS. There was also a Macan and a Cayenne. 

From Foreign Cars Italia in Charlotte, here's my favorite car of the day, the new Ferrari 296GTS, with V6 hybrid power good for 819 combined horsepower (electric plus gas) good for 205 MPH. 

They were not offering rides in the Ferrari, and not even letting you in the driver's seat. 
I believe this paint job identifies it as an Assetto Fiorano, so it probably is even fancier than your basic 296GTS. 

The GTS part of the name tells you it is a convertible. If you've got say $330,000 laying around, you might want to buy one. 

Yes, the engine is in the middle somewhere behind the driver. 

When I win the BIG lottery, I'll have to think about something practical to drive, like this $308,000 SUV from Aston Martin!

The DBX707 has a 4-liter twin turbo V8, good for 697 horsepower, top speed of only 193mph. OK, it's not as fast as the Ferrari above, but, well, you could carry three friends with you while you drive this one!

It's some kind of orange, so maybe that's the theme for today!

Stay tuned, we'll be back with more from the Charlotte Auto Show soon.