sampelligrino

Hey guys,

Trying to piece together this bucket list trip from reading other people's threads and sending a handful of people PMs, this is my first time ever doing euro delivery and its been awhile since I was last in Europe (mainly London and Paris) so I am new to this. I was happy to hear that euro delivery would be coming back in 2018 as since I was kid I wanted to do this with my old man...

Schedule (late March to early April 2018)

*Pre-Delivery*
2 days in London (hang out and enjoy, get adjusted a bit with the time since we will fly SFO->LHR->Stuttgart)

*Delivery*
DAY 1 - STUTTGART (check out Porsche/Benz museums, see some of the city if its worth it, contain excitement)
DAY 2 - STUTTGART (delivery day!!!!! enjoy the factory tour, car, drive around Stuttgart a bit)
DAY 3 - ROMANTIC ROAD
DAY 4 - GENEVA/CERN (enjoy the town, maybe find cool sights and drives nearby)
DAY 5 - EZE (maybe try to explore some of the Monte Carlo rally route, Route de Gentelly)
DAY 6, 7, 8 - TUSCANY/FLORENCE (enjoy some wine tastings, scenery, drives, visit Maranello for a day, Lamborghini, visit Imola)
DAY 9, 10 - MILAN (enjoy the city and sights, maybe drive to Como)
DAY 11 - ZURICH (enjoy city and sights, drive around)
DAY 12,13,14,15 - STUTTGART (have 4 days to explore before drop off. Planning to do a scenic Black Forest drive, do a Nurburgring lap, visit Motorworld dealership, maybe drive to Affalterbach if I can see some cool AMG stuff, and find very cool drives to enjoy the car before dropping her off)

A bit overwhelming to figure out hotels and where we will be with the car on any given day, let alone making sure that the hotel has adequate parking and is safe for the car. Maybe I am overthinking this a bit, but this is something that I really want to make an event out of and make sure it's planned appropriately to make some awesome memories with my dad and the car.

I guess I'm hoping for help to lock down a good "route" then plan logistics accordingly.

My questions are:

• Any "must see" experiences in Germany, Switzerland, Italy, France that are roughly in the striking area of our planned route? We are open to all ideas
• Did you guys book your hotels and lodging first, then work backwards from that, rather than the other way around?
• Any concerns for the Porsche abroad in terms of security? I read always try to self-park if you can but my guess is most hotels will be valet
• PPF, I think that I am going to pass on this until the car arrives stateside. It kind of takes some of the excitement out of the euro delivery if we take delivery then have to immediately take it to SchwabenFolia and not see it for a couple days, rather than immediately hit the road after delivery. I just hope the paint doesn't take too much of a beating while we drive it in Europe for 2 weeks
• Vignette - read that I'll need one for Switzerland and it's best to order ahead of time and bring with you, any other countries need this?
• AAA international driver's license, a must-have?

Any and all other tips, comments, input is GREATLY appreciated my friends. Worked very hard to get this allocation/car and now really hoping to make this the trip of a lifetime...some speed bumps along the way are inevitable I am sure but hope to be as prepared as possible for April..can't wait!!

subshooter

Fantastic! I have embedded my answers below. I hope it helps. Jamie is awesome to work with and I am really glad you get to experience this trip with your dad in a GT3! Congrats.

Some other thoughts. The Stelvio pass (if open during your trip) is very touristy. I'd drive it just so that you can say you did it. Go early in the morning. It might be quiet at that time of year though. It still had snow on it when I went in July. The curves are really steep and I scraped my 981 on many of them with only PASM. Your GT3 would be a problem unless you have the FAL. My favorite Swiss pass was the Furka pass. Beautiful! I will post my videos from Stelvio and Furka in an additional post below.

Consider Zermatt. Google the pics. It is just gorgeous.

subshooter

Stelvio pass in a 2014 Boxster S.

subshooter

Furka Pass in a 2014 Porsche Boxster S

sampelligrino

Thanks subshooter for the input. Just watched your euro delivery video and it was very informative, thank you for putting that together

The notes about the plug kit, phone number of Porsche dealers in the area were good ideas I didn't think of just to be safe...ironically enough I think I told you this in PM but your Stelvio Pass video has been bookmarked on my laptop for 3+ years from when I first came across it lol...unfortunately I think it won't be open or safe to drive in April

Here is my new route that I came up with in planning my trip with my dad:

*Pre-Delivery*
2 days in London (hang out and enjoy, get adjusted a bit with the time since we will fly SFO->LHR->Stuttgart)

*Delivery*
DAY 1 - STUTTGART (check out Porsche/Benz museums, see some of the city if its worth it, contain excitement)
DAY 2 - STUTTGART (delivery day!!!!! enjoy the factory tour, car, drive around Stuttgart a bit)
DAY 3 - GENEVA (early AM 6 hour drive to Geneva)
DAY 4 - GENEVA/CERN (enjoy the town, maybe find cool sights and drives nearby)
DAY 5 - MONACO (early AM 6 hour drive to Monaco)
DAY 6, 7, 8 - TUSCANY (early AM drive to Tuscany, enjoy some wine tastings, scenery, drives, visit Maranello for a day)
DAY 9, 10 - MILAN (early AM drive to Milan, enjoy the city and sights, maybe drive to Como)
DAY 11 - ZURICH (early AM drive to Zurich, enjoy city and sights, drive around)
DAY 12,13,14,15 - STUTTGART (early AM drive to Stuttgart, and have 4 days to explore before drop off. Planning to do a scenic Black Forest drive, do a Nurburgring lap, visit Motorworld dealership, maybe drive to Affalterbach if I can see some cool AMG stuff, and find very cool drives to enjoy the car before dropping her off)

Hoping to get any input out there for the planned route! Would love tips for any of the drives and routes we should take, hope to be avoiding freeways and enjoying backroads and whatnot as much as possible. Have not the slightest idea what I'm doing

subshooter

Sounds fantastic! Enjoy it and I am looking forward to your future posts!

lbcgolf

You do know that the Nurburgring is not local, right? 4 hours in moderate traffic, next state over in Rheinland-Pfalz.

Five12Free

If you plan on doing the black Forrest run, taking the 28 to Strasbourg for lunch is a great day trip. Then you can take the autobahn back through Karlsruhe for some no limit fun

sampelligrino

Yeah - plan to burn likely a day for the ring before the car heads stateside, even at just 50 KPH soiling myself have to do it

Awesome - thanks for the tip

beoliving

if you plan to drive up north for the Ring, suggest you take a more scenic route from (autobahn up here) Bingen up to Boppard at the river Rhein. At Boppard, take the L207 to cross the Mosel (on other nice river with the most famous vinyards in Germany) to go to Münstermaifeld and than to the ring. Even as a local I do the drive over and over again. so many castles along the way and nice empty roads.

sampelligrino

Perfect - I will add that to my travel notes, thanks for the tip - this is the exact input im looking for, to take scenic routes with the car rather than autobahns/freeways if possible

Kobalt

Send me an PM when you know you are in Nürburgring: If I'm there I can give you a couple of taxi laps if you want.

sampelligrino

Awesome thanks for the offer, I will PM you when I know the exact time. I read that it's better to go during the normal week rather than weekends for a casual/leisure drive around the ring since it will operate more like a public road than race circuit? I have literally never driven on a track before so my plan was to go 50 KPH and do a 15 minute lap with my right turn blinker on most of the way lol. Just want to cross it off my bucket list that I did a lap on the 'Ring, and not do anything stupid in my first GT car. I also have some youtube videos bookmarked for beginners driving the Nurburgring.

Kobalt

There is generally fewer cars on the track during weekdays then the weekends. But it is still very much very fast cars there.

I would suggest driving the track as a normal road:
Don't drive faster than you can see.
Stay on the right side.
If you gonna overtake: Look in your mirrors (a lot). Overtake on the left side.
Do not make any sudden moves - stay on your line.
Be prepared to be overtaken by cars travelling at very high speed.
Try to learn from video where the Adenauer Forst corner is: It is the most likely place for you to go off the track. It is a weird corner
If rain: Be very careful, it is extremely slippery at a couple of places on the track.

My opinion is that driving the track at 50km/h is actually dangerous - I've done it because of a flat tire in a race and it is very scary and dangerous.
The reason is that 70% of the corners on Nordschleife are hidden: The longer you keep your car on the the racing line when the place you are at are hidden, the bigger the risk for accident is.

sampelligrino

Kobalt those are great, great tips/advice and all make sense - thanks for sharing my friend. I will be sure to try and connect with you prior to my "ring run"

Again I want be clear that I have not the slightest experience in track driving, so I will be extremely careful but will pick up the pace faster than 50km/h as you say to decrease chances of being hidden on a corner