A360P

Porsche 550 Spyder

About a week after returning from seeing the Porsche 550 (replica or otherwise) in Austria, I was passed by an equally loud Porsche 550 (replica or otherwise) on PCH. I couldn't get a close-enough shot of the old CA license plate to know whether this was an original or replica, but the car seemed nicely done either way. No bumpers, louder than hell, and it looked like a lot of fun.

A Couple of Photos from Vienna

I was in Austria in mid-June and got some shots of a few interesting cars while there:

This Smart Roadster is so much better looking than the rolling boxes on sale now here in the USA. I hadn't seen a fastback version like this before, but I like the look a lot. (Here's another from earlier this year that I rode around in while visiting Australia)

On the other hand, if a boxy Smart car its good enough for Niki Lauda (and Lauda-Motion mods), it should be good enough for me, right?

This Porsche (or replicar) had a low-frequency note in its exhaust that seemed as loud as the sounds made by Blue Whales (although they'd be kind of raspy Blue Whales):

And finally, proof that even the most mundane econo-car can look racy when shot with the wrong camera setting while passing through a tunnel:

Porsche Carrera GT

(23 June, 2009)

While I tend to prefer Italian over German styling, I caught up with this Porsche Carrera GT a little further down PCH than the Lamborghini I saw at Topanga and I've got to say that I prefer the style of this car over the Murciélago. They're both roughly in the same price range, they do a lot of the same things well (like go fast), and I'm highly unlikely to ever be faced with trying to decide between buying one or the other, so why not be picky?

From this rear view, the Carrera GT reminds me of some of the "Cars of the Future" that GM, Ford, and Chrysler had designed for the big car shows. Looking like some sort of a cross between Buckminster Fuller engineering design and a dishwasher from The Jetsons, the car looks svelte and muscular at the same time, putting forth a rather sinister demeanor, albeit in a fun-loving, sunshine-enjoying sort of way.  While the Carrera GT is capable of all sorts of pyrotechnics and automobilic histrionics, this particular one was being driven in a decidedly non-spirited manner. It was certainly a nice day at the beach, so why not take his time? Only maybe next time he could be taking in the sights and the clean air in the right-hand/slow lane, so that people who haven't yet amassed enough screen credits to buy any Porsche (much less a GT) wouldn't have to swerve to get around him.

Yes, jealousy and envy are insidious emotions...I'll try to work on them.

Passion at the Topanga Beach Motel (Lamborghini division)

23 June, 2009

I don't usually show license plates on this blog, but if you're driving a bright white Lamborghini Murciélago LP640 Roadster down PCH in the middle of the day, sporting a personalized plate such as this one, it's not as if stealth is likely to be one of the main things on your mind...

Close Call for a Porsche 911

As I was driving back down from the Hospice du Rhône on Sunday morning, while passing through San Luis Obispo we caught up with three older Porsche 911s that were being escorted by a CHP motorcycle officer. They were moving along at about 55 mph and a truck pulled out to pass them.
He was going maybe 58 mph and after about two miles he hadn't yet cleared the three cars and the CHP guy pulled behind him to maybe hurry things up a bit. I'm not sure whether the driver saw the cop or just decided to pull back into the slow lane, but he apparently hadn't noticed that he hadn't quite cleared the lead car. Fortunately, the driver was paying attention, and as the trailer began crossing over into his lane, he moved over onto the side of the road, maintaining his speed (and presumably, his composure).

http://www.hospicedurhone.org/
The CHP officer then hit his lights and siren and pulled the truck over, and with the accident averted, the Porsches continued along to their destination.

I found the stickers on the back of the trailer to be more than a little appropriate: 

BTW, about 20 miles south of this almost-an-incident, the odometer on A360P went over 100K. So much for the warranty; I'm happy that nothing major has gone wrong with this car thus far. It either speaks volumes for the quality of VW's construction (at least where the R32 is concerned) or maybe to the value of proactive maintenance. My 1999 VW GTI VR-6 made it to 170K without anything dire occurring and I'm hoping to enjoy the same reliability with the R32.  

Going to the matte for the coolest car in Malibu

At least I think that it's the coolest car around here. The Porsche 911 Turbo Cabriolet is a breathtaking car in terms of its engineering and appearance, but "subtlety" isn't a word that springs to mind when you see one roaring down the road. While Porsche's paint schemes are not as diverse as those of say, Lamborghini, a Porsche cabrio definitely falls into the "look-at-me" category, even here in Malibu.

The issue was resolved by the owner of this circa-2005 911 by using a thick matte-black paint, seemingly applied with a roller and paintbrush. The rumor around town is that the paint was leftover from the Burbank skunkworks and had been developed for use on stealth bombers...given enough financial resources, almost anything can be done, so even though the "a bucket of pain fell off a truck on the 101" explanation sounds a little far-fetched, it could well be true. 

Everything on the car has been blacked out, and it's got some serious tinting on the windows completing the look. This sort of finish forces you to contemplate the car as purely as a machine, focussing on the art of the function (and the engineering), something that's rare out here. Not all cars look good blacked out like this; I'm not sure what to think about the Rolls-Royce Phantom I saw at the Toys 4 Tots show last December:

The car is just so big that the matte finish is unbecoming, as it's difficult to get away from the bling-factor inherent in a Rolls-Royce. This car was well turned-out (fantastic interior work) but aesthetically, it just doesn't seem right to me, whereas the size and shape of the Porsche 911 Turbo Cabriolet works just fine. 

San Juan Bautista to King City, 13 April, 2009

It's 64 miles between San Juan Bautista and King City if you stay on Highway 101. It's an okay route, taking you past the bustling metropoli of Salinas, Soledad, Chualar, and Greenfield before finally arriving at the oasis of freeway gas stations and fast food joints visible in King City. On the other hand, if you veer off the freeway at San Juan Bautista (home of one of the California Missions) and head to Hollister (site of the 1947 biker shindig that was documented in "The Wild One"), you'll be able to enjoy another one of the state's best drives. And the kicker is that this route adds a mere four miles to the length of the otherwise dullsville drive down the 101. 

I stopped in Hollister to make some phone calls and noticed that my car had reached a mileage semi-milestone: 

There's something about documenting the mileage numbers that end in a lot of zeroes that I don't know why they're more important than random numbers, but here it is. What it does remind me of is the fact that I've got 2K left on the warranty, so if anything big is going to break, I hope it happens real soon. 

Heading south out of Hollister is CA 25 (also listed as the Airline Highway), a two-lane road that attracts lots of motorcycle riders and probably a lot of CHP officers on the weekends but is very open at 9:30 on a Monday morning. On the entire stretch I encountered four cars, and the road's long straights and broad vistas make passing very easy to accomplish. Just past the County Fairgrounds, I passed some extensive vineyard plantings. 

San Benito County has always been the home (at least in my mind) of smaller, boutique producers such as Calera and Enz Vineyards, but in reality, it was at one time home to Almaden, one of the state's more influential wineries in the last century. This vineyard in Paicines is now owned by Diageo, having purchased it from whoever owned it before Heublein, who bought it from Almaden. I shouldn't have been surprised, as the area was once the source of much of the fruit that went into Almaden wines, so the fountain of juice coming from this 700 acre vineyard and into bottles of Sterling and BV has some historical precedent in addition to its medicinal use. The other wineries in the area are up off the valley floor and aren't visible from the road (or I just wasn't paying any attention).

Heading further south from the vineyards you pass the Pinnacles National Monument, some impressive looking rocks, on the other side of which are the original vineyard plantings of Chalone, as well as Michael Michaud's winery. Here the road starts to open up even more, with long-range views of the road up ahead, set among vast meadows and plains. 

The quality of the pavement is pretty good, and with the great view and empty roads, there's a slight tendency to hit the accelerator pedal pretty hard. There are few sharp curves and the two-lane road is wide enough to accommodate just about any car that can attain any speed. I'd like to think that this is the sort of road that an older 12-cylinder Ferrari was designed for. 

The turnoff heading toward King City takes you up and over the hill, with a marvelous view once you get up to the top:

After some easy twisties in the hill, it's a gradual drop into King City, a town that's based around agriculture. 

I stopped for gas and headed toward my Santa Maria meeting on 101. It was an exceptional morning of driving, definitely removing the "just a commuter" aspect from the journey. 

Skyline Therapy, 13 April, 2009

I had an amazing trip yesterday morning from Petaluma down to Malibu. It was incredible not only for the driving but for the spring scenery, my favorite season in California.

I left Petaluma around 6 AM. The sun was just coming up and there was very little traffic all the way into San Francisco. the Golden Gate bridge this early in the morning is a wondrous sight, all the more so when it's almost devoid of other cars. 

Not having anything set up until a noon appointment in Santa Maria, I took 25th street through San Francisco, down past UCSF to 280. The radio station was talking about all sorts of mayhem occurring on the other freeways, but things were definitely going my way as I went down the peninsula and took the turnoff for Skyline Boulevard, or State Route 35. This one of the state's finest roads to drive, particularly early in the morning when the lack of school busses, bicyclists, county sheriffs, and tourists makes it possible to open open it up a bit. 

Once leaving 280, the trip along Skyline is about 35 miles of pure enjoyment until you've reached Highway 17 and you descend into Los Gatos and onto 85 toward Gilroy. This is an excruciatingly beautiful route, with lots of twisting curves through a redwood forest, occasionally broken up by broad vistas overlooking the entire southern part of the SF bay. There were patches of fog to heighten the driving experience and taking this detour (it's a mere 30 miles if you were to stay on the 280) was a very relaxing experience.

There's something definitely therapeutic about spirited driving (that's what they call it in the car magazines, right?) in a VW R32 on an empty road and under ideal conditions. Skyline is fairly wide and with excellent sightlines, at least until you get a little past Big Basin Road, at which point it narrows to about a lane and-a-half (watch out for slow-moving garbage trucks!) and the sharp corners start to come about every 50 feet. The houses along this stretch seem to be owned either by old hippies or by dot.com moguls (not that the two groups are mutually exclusive) but it seems like it's a part of town where you live if you don't thrive on dealing with civilization often. Following Skyline all the way to Black Road, I made it down to Highway 17 by a little before 8 AM. Twisty, curvy, and downhill...driving doesn't get much better than this (a GPS might have come in handy though).

2010 BMW X5-M

Or maybe it's a BMW X6-M....very aggressive front end styling flows through to the back. It's got a really nice look to it, and from all reports the engine options are going to give the Porsche and Mercedes SUVs a run for their money. The BMW 6.0 liter V12 would likely move this thing right along the freeway. The driver heading up PCH didn't seem to be in much of a hurry, but I was so I was unable to get a better photo. Maybe next time...

Unfortunate Automobile Accessory Choices

These wheels just aren't doing it for me:  

At a Holden show, Tanunda, South Australia, March 30, 2009