Thanks for getting this started Santa Fe. Sorry it took so long to find the time to update you. Here is a little info on how our 3rd day went.
We started our day in Mayen, at Ina's Aunt Petra and Uncle Haralds, who were kind enough to put us up for the night on very short notice, due to our sudden change of plans. Mayen is in the Koblenz area, about 30 km away from the Nurburgring. Here is the first sign that we saw as we were leaving. So tempting.....
Day 3 would be an autobahn day. Our destination would be Ina's home town of Haren, in Emsland, where Ina and I would be attending the wedding of two of her close friends. But the beginning of our ride was pretty interesting. We decided to ride up along the Rhein River on the B-9, which is very pretty. We took a very small ferry across the Rhein to Bonn, the former capitol of Germany.
Now that's a sign that you don't want to see when you're driving an expensive car.
Once across the Rhein, we were greeted by Ina's cousin Julian. He was super excited to show us around Bonn, where he lives and attends school. He and his friend Max took us into town for a nice lunch.
The cities in Germany are very picturesque. They are very clean and very cozy.
Here you can see Ina, Julian and Max on the left and the place we ate lunch on the right.
You have to love the German food. I had a nice schnitzel that looked like this (probably not the healthiest meal, but damn tasty):
After lunch we walked back to Julian's school and took a little tour, then it was off to the autobahn. Contrary to popular belief, there are speed limits on most parts of the autobahn. You can drive for quite a while before you see one of these:
That's the sign you want to see. It loosely translates to 'Punch It...!' It means that the previous speed limit no longer applies. If you are in the city and you see this, it means you can drive up to 100 km/h. If you are on the autobahn, it's an invitation to test the limits of your car.
We had started the day with about 550 km on the odometer. Using my modified break in procedure, this would allow us to gently work our way up to about 4,700 RPM. That translates to about 190 km/h (~120 mph).
Honestly, and I don't mean this in a bad way, but this speed quickly becomes boring in the Cayman. The excitement is gone in about 30 seconds. The car is just so good at what it does that 120 mph feels ordinary and relaxed. I guess this is an amazing testament to the car's abilities, but this is going to be a big problem for me once I get my car back home. I foresee many track days in our future......
After varying our speed up and down from about 160 - 190 km/h for an hour or so, we found ourselves in a little speed battle with an Audi A-4 and a BMW 3 something. These guys wanted to show the Porsche that they were fast too. I was doing so good, sticking to the break in so well. It was killing me that these guys were inviting me to a little contest, on a road with no limits where I can legally destroy them, but I have to behave. Arghhhh........
At first, we came creeping up on them at about 190. Then we came up on some traffic which slowed us down. When the traffic cleared, they did the polite thing and moved to the center to allow the faster cars to go by. This gave us the opportunity to use the Cayman's power. Even with our self imposed limit of <5,000 RPM, we left them in our mirror like they were dead. See ya......
I guess this challenged them, because they did eventually catch up and it was obvious that they felt we were competing. We pulled over and let them by. They crept by us. You could tell they were practically flat out and approaching the limits of their car's acceleration. Oh god, the temptation was killing me. But I let them by and watched them approach the horizon without us. Suddnely I experienced a moment of weakness. I remembered what the folks at Porsche told us. They said it's OK to push it to 7,000 but keep it brief. I couldn't take it any more. OK, that's it. I just can't resist this opportunity. I decided to allow myself to push her to 6,000, for just a moment.
I dropped to 5th and nailed it. As the engine came past 5,000 RPM the sound changed. The car left that mellow growl behind and started to sound violent as if the engine was erupting out of control. At about 5,200 I felt a distinct rush of torque, which I haven't seen on any charts. The engine rushed to 6,000 RPM, then I shifted to 6th and kept it on. We caught up to the Audi and BMW so fast it was like we were riding a missile. They moved over and we blew by. I kept her pegged until we hit 6,000 in 6th. OH-MY-GOD. What a freaking rush. We were now doing about 235 km/h (~148 mph) and the excitement was exponentially greater than that of 190 km/h (118 mph). The BMW and Audi were a distant memory and stood no chance of catching us.
The adrenaline rush was amazing. I let out a loud 'Wooooooo......!', which scared the hell out of Ina. Now that's what I'm talking about.....! This is what I signed up for. That was absolutely incredible..... I gently brought her back down to 190 km/h (5,000 rpm) and let her cool down. I then took the next exit and turned the wheel over to Ina for the rest of the ride.
I have more to write, and want to share my impressions of the car, but I am out of time. Stay tuned. I will write more when I can. This car is AMAZING....!