SVT2888
Member
Registered: 16th Nov 09
User status: Offline
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This past weekend I went on a drive with some friends. Three of the four of us had partied the night before and had hardly slept, but come one, it’s a drive! Sleep chosen over getting to enjoy some of the best and most scenic roads California has to offer? NEVER!
My friend Joe, the one with the best car and the one who didn’t party, did all the driving. We rode along in his recently purchased 2011 BMW 335d. He’s so in love with his diesel’s fuel mileage that he has put 3k miles on it in the month that he has owned the car. In fact, just three hours after he drove out of the dealership I joined him on a canyon run.
The canyon fun on this run started in the affluent town of Montecito. You know you’re in an affluent neighborhood when you start seeing Sotherby’s Real Estate signs on lawns, and you can’t even see the houses from the road because the fences are so high. Soon enough, however, the fancy houses stopped and we hit the rural areas of Santa Barbara, which is where the roads got really good.
Super tight twisties with lanes that narrower than the car, that to us is perfection. As we ascended higher into the hills surrounding Santa Barbara the road surface got poorer, but the views got better and better. We could see all of Santa Barbara below us with the ocean providing a beautiful back drop. Eventually we made it to Solvang for brunch (at 5pm) using canyon roads almost exclusively. Never once did anyone feel car sick, though it was probably due to the fact that we hadn’t eaten. Heck, we were having so much fun we had forgotten all about food.
How could you think about food when the roads you are traveling go from butter smooth through affluent neighborhoods, to rough in the hills, then you hit the valleys were they turn into dirt, eventually going into the woods. We did water crossings, encountered pot holes that could swallow a smart car and went over dozens of cow catchers. We never encountered a cop, and mostly just saw a few pick-up trucks driven by farmers who were probably thinking “These yuppies must be lost!”
At the end of the day we did 470 miles of nothing but canyon roads. The round trip took a total of about 10 hours, though we did kill a lot of time stopping for pictures and walking around Solvang looking for a place to eat. In the end we had a fun adventure, which made us closer friends and we got to see parts of California where few venture. All this while riding in what might just be one of the best daily drivers out there.The 335d allows you to get great fuel mileage without having to sacrifice in the fun department. If I had the money I would be all over one.
Towards the end of the drive, Joe brought up a good point; If you told a regular person, “Yeah I spent my Sunday driving around for fun through the canyons.” They’d probably think you were mad. They’d probably ask you “Why would you spend your whole day just driving around? You didn’t even have to!” But a regular person always sees driving as a chore; the Purist see it as a way to de-stress. We see it as a way to discover new places and get to know our car more. If we bring friends along, it’s a way to become closer with them and share in the adventure. We don’t always have to go on drives though; sometimes we are just happy sitting around talking cars, working on cars, or washing our cars. We’ll go to a car show and right after go home and instead of resting we start uploading and sharing our pics. Or we’ll go somewhere and sit down to discuss cars. We think about cars all day every day. Outsiders think we are weird, but when we are around other Purists we are seen as regular people.
I’d like to ask you guys, what do you see as the definition of an automotive “Purist” and would you consider yourself one?
http://hooniverse.com/
view the full-gallery at http://www.cncpics.com/2012/October/Sunday-Drive/26217981_C2nQTD
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Ian
Site Administrator
Registered: 28th Aug 99
Location: Liverpool
User status: Offline
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Stunning pics.
I go on trips myself but one hundred miles at most and its not possible to do all of that on nice roads.
I'd have probably chosen a convertible and gone alone but still awesome, great post.
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mike56gte
Member
Registered: 23rd Jun 09
Location: Fife, scotland Drives: Audi S3
User status: Offline
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Great read and great pics. The 335d is such a great car.
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Alex_Rally
Member
Registered: 6th Sep 09
Location: Tyne and Wear, gateshead
User status: Offline
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i would love to live in america
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Simon_16v
Member
Registered: 14th Aug 06
Location: Yorkshire
User status: Offline
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Looks awesome, wish we had some road like that around here!
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benpep
Member
Registered: 5th Oct 12
Location: york
User status: Offline
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that looks ace,them roads are just naughty!!!
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random dav
Premium Member
Registered: 7th Jan 04
Location: NSW
User status: Offline
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awesome, looks fantastic!
WRLFC !
Project cars
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Mike
Organiser: North West and North Wales
Premium Member
Registered: 20th May 06
Location: nr. Skipton, North Yorkshire
User status: Offline
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Mmm, might borrow my Brother's car and go for a mooch after reading this, I'm feeling inspired 
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pow
Premium Member
Registered: 11th Sep 06
Location: Hazlemere, Buckinghamshire
User status: Offline
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quote:
Originally posted by Mike
Mmm, might borrow my Brother's car and go for a mooch after reading this, I'm feeling inspired
Remember the sport mode!
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Ben G
Member
Registered: 12th Jan 07
Location: Essex
User status: Offline
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I'd love for you to write a book of some sort, about cars and driving. Include pics also 
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Sly_SRi
Premium Member
Registered: 9th Apr 04
Location: Reading, UK Drives: Corsa C
User status: Offline
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I think purist is another word for obsessed.
Corsa C Z20Let
Black Sleeper Turbo Project
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Jambo
Member
Registered: 8th Sep 01
Location: Maidenhead, Drives: VXR Arctic
User status: Offline
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Purist has many connotations. However a lot of the time I find people who bark on about it all the time are generally insecure about how much of a "purist" they are so overcompensate.
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Jambo
Member
Registered: 8th Sep 01
Location: Maidenhead, Drives: VXR Arctic
User status: Offline
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Beautiful pics btw
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