I took the family (my wife Kerry and two sons Ben, 11 and James, 8 ) to France a couple of weeks ago for the annual summer holiday. Now, we were supposed to be going in our trusty Subaru Legacy Estate (another flat 6) as we were taking our springer spaniel, Maggie along. Due to booking her jabs a day late, we were unable to secure her passport in time for the holiday. The family were devastated so I suggested we take the 997 to ease the dissappointment.
We went to a lovely area of France called Jura, just on the Swiss border. It is the French lake district if you like and it's more a mountains and country outdoors type holiday than beach which suits us nicely.
As many of you might know, we are veteran Euro tourers having been all over Europe in our 996 and RB5 Impreza on several different trips, touring France, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Luxemburg, Italy, Spanish Pyrennees, Corsica, Slovenia, Norway, Sweden, Denmark to name but a few. We've done many of the big mountain passes (Stelvio etc), Milau bridge, Route Napolean, Reims circuit, Nurburgring etc etc.
The 996 was a superb touring car and we always used to comment that we couldn't think of a better one to do these trips in, practical (with a bit of care and sense), fast, relatively good fuel economy (good range) and very comfortable. The 997 however takes all of these and improves, it's astonishing. Obviously this is partly down to PASM adjustable suspension for comfort on motorways and sporty in the hills, something I thought I would not like about the car has turned into one of the things I like most! Passengers definately appreciate it. Overall the 1500 miles were carried out at an average of 60mph and 28mpg, not bad! We travelled from the centre of Paris to our house in Buckinghamshire on one tank of fuel!
One morning, I fancied going out for a blast to the Swiss border, so left the family at the swimming pool and took some superb country roads in the foothills, they were very light of traffic and I just had enough to play with and keep it interesting, putting in overtakes every now and then and then on to some bigger mountains. The result of this was as follows:
I travelled over the Col de La Faucille, info here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Col_de_la_Faucille
This is a pretty serious pass (a Tour de France favourite), not as tight as the Stelvio and the like but a challenge as a driver with many hairpins and other bends and for me a better drive for it.
On one of the hairpins, this one greater than 180 degrees!:
View over Lake Geneva and Mont Blanc Alpine range behind.
Thought I’d get the car looked over on the way back:
The car was superb, sports exhaust makes a terrific noise against the rock faces with the window down and it just shifts, so much power! The locals were impressed anyway with waves and cap off salutes as I went, something you don’t see in this country!
We all had a superb holiday, but the idea came up to drive home via Paris as James wanted to see the Eifel Tower.
We drove right in to Paris, toured the city, parked and had lunch on the Champs Elysees (£50 plus £45 for 4 drinks!) whilst watching all the supercars and supermodels trundle by and topped it off for a drive around the Arc De Triomphe. That was the single most difficult driving experience for me to date, got the heart rate right up! Passengers were mostly screaming!
Anyway, hope you enjoyed the report and it makes you go and do a tour for yourself, if you are thinking about it, just do it!
Next instalment – January 2012, driving 997 to Les Menuires at the top of the French Alps for a week’s skiing
