Day 1: Manhattan to Lexington, VA; 477 miles; “How Bad Can the Rain Be?”

[From 2009]

We started the day very early, taking advantage of the relative calm to do some shooting with photographer Daniel Byrne for this article.  Coincidentally, we shot in many of the same NYC places as in The Gumball Rally: across 59^th Street in front of the Plaza hotel and into Columbus Circle, crossing Times Square, coming out of Grand Central Terminal onto Park Avenue.  After finally making it out of Manhattan, we detoured through a surprisingly pastoral part of New Jersey, where Daniel shot us while kneeling and facing backwards in the 16M.  

Then torrential downpours hit, as bad a rainstorm as we’ve ever seen outside the tropics.  Cars were pulled over on the side of I-78, but the 612 Scaglietti was supremely stable and confident even in these conditions; the 16M slightly less so.  The McLaren was downright scary, and the downforce it generated was literally vacuuming the water off the road, making it impossible for anyone behind it to see.  So we decided to call in the cavalry early.  The transporter met us and we loaded up the McLaren.  We had a late lunch at a traditional NJ diner, where buckets were catching the cascading rain dripping down around our table. 

Now about 4 hours behind schedule, we began picking our way through the 2-lane traffic down I-78 and I-81.  We made up a lot of the deficit, arriving at Front Royal, Virginia, in the late afternoon, where the rain had stopped. We set off for Skyline Drive through Shenandoah National Park, accepting the fact that the drive would be slow, but the spectacular scenery was high on our checklist. 

As expected, the road built by FDR’s Works Progress Administration was stunning.  Vistas opened up on either side of the road, and we stopped at plenty of overlooks for photos and just to gape.  Our average speed getting to Skyline was great, and now it was plummeting, but we didn’t care.

And the panoramas got even more breathtaking as the sun set, with a misty gloom settling over the valley, while we looked from on high.  After exiting Skyline Drive, we decided to continue South on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  No longer monitored by park rangers and well into deep dusk, it was time to pick up the pace.  As Dan exclaimed, this drive was transcendent.  With bi-xenon headlights cutting through the encroaching darkness, top and windows down, the ripping sounds of Italian engines, and a winding, rolling ribbons of pavement ahead, it was nirvana.

When we reluctantly turned off for I-81, we stopped for dinner at, yes, Burger King.  Picking Lexington, VA as our stopping point, we ended up at Col Alto, a historic manor house now turned into a Hampton Inn.  A motel never felt so luxurious.