We had an absolutely amazing trip. Great people, stunning roads, and great cars of course. The fun factor for me was right up there with the best days of snowboarding or surfing that I've had.
I started on Wednesday morning from Amsterdam with the intention of taking two days to drive to Dornbirn so I could take mainly country roads through Luxembourg, the Vosges, and the Black Forest. However in Belgium, when I stopped for lunch, I saw oil fumes coming from the engine grill and the whole engine bay was splattered with oil. Oh-oh... After cleaning and revving the engine it was clear that the oil line to the left head and chain tensioner was leaking.
Luckily I was very close to the Spa-Francorchamps track where there's a Porsche specialist. We tracked down the part and the next day they drove to Liege to get it from Porsche and by 11:30, my car was fixed and I still made it to Dornbirn in time for dinner via the Autobahn. Big thanks to LLM Mecasport for helping me so quickly!
The next day we left via Switzerland and Liechtenstein and then the roads opened up. The Flüela Pass was fantastic ...
... the Umbrail Pass was even better, mainly because it was narrow and empty ...
... but the Stelvio was the highlight of the day. Andreas and I had great fun chasing each other and taking pictures and the views and the way the road is carved into the mountain is simply breathtaking.
When you get into the forest, the road gets faster and it with both our cars having MFI, it was an awesome experience to hear Andreas' 2.4 S screaming out of a corner and then hearing the same noise from my own engine. Finally we arrived in warm and lush Merano between the wine fields, a complete contrast with the barren mountain landscapes that we had seen earlier.
The next day we did a round trip in the Dolomites, a fantastic area with bizarre steep rock faces that tower above the mountains. And of course great and sometimes empty driving roads. There is no greater joy than running up a mountain pass full throttle with the MFI pump screaming behind your head like a roaring animal. It's clear that our cars were designed to do this: everything just starts to work together in harmony, the steering, suspension, engine and even the 915 gearbox feels just right.
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