Other than when you’re heel-toeing in your pajamas as you pilot car-shaped polygons through a flat-screen LED landscape, you probably don’t like or ever want to be scared by the roads or terrain you’re driving on.
Challenging roads are fun, bring ’em on. You can just take it easier, go slower, or turn around if a set of twisty bits proves too taxing or a trail is gnarlier than what you’re up for. But a dangerous road (or bridge, or tunnel, or trail) that simply must be traveled to reach the destination will have any driver looking for a detour. And those are the driving experiences we’re Autopian Asking you about today!
I got to drive what would have been some truly harrowing roads and trails along the Baja peninsula thanks to a press trip back in the aughts. Radio-control car maker HPI Racing introduced its Baja 5b gas buggy by flying the editors of the big four RC buff books (print magazines were still a thing then) to Mexico for a tour with Wide Open Baja. We spent two days in the outfit’s VW-powered buggies with stops along the way to wheel the new 1/5 scale model. Lots of fun, as you can imagine.
I say the roads would have been harrowing because instead of being alone in the desert in a “regular” car or truck that might not make it through (or home), we were on a tour with guides in purpose-built off-roaders, and each driver could go as slow as they wanted or fast as they dared, which was rarely as fast as the buggies could go. Challenging and fun, yes, but scary, no.
Here’s what used to really give me serious four-wheel frights:
The Jamestown [expletive] Bridge.
I swear, I just shuddered typing the words. This overgrown, underbuilt, Erector-set-looking steel structure was a sphincter-clencher on a number of levels. First, it only had two lanes. No, not two in each direction, two lanes total. And they were narrow, with no room for a breakdown, and nothing to separate you from the cars hurtling toward you other than a mutual desire to complete the crossing alive. Second, the bridge was not paved. No no. Instead, you drove over steel grating. I kid you not, you could see through the driving surface to the cold water below, which really made you appreciate every inch of the 135 feet you would fall if you drove over the side of the bridge (I recall the guard rails being about as thick as electrical conduit) or the whole damn thing collapsed beneath you. And it definitely felt like the whole damn thing might collapse beneath you. The weight of traffic alone was enough to make it buck and bounce, and when the wind got up (which it did, frequently), you could feel it yaw and sway. I have no doubt many prayers were uttered between the shores that wretched bridge spanned until it was finally closed in 1992 with the opening of the rock-solid Jamestown Verrazano Bridge – side by side below.
The old steel structure only got scarier as it rusted and nature tried to reclaim it, evolving into a ruddy green-veined hulk as vines crawled over the corroding girders. It stood until 2006, when explosives were used to bring the monster down. Its steel bones went to the scrapyard and the moorings were planted elsewhere as artificial reefs, but I swear, you can still hear it creaking and popping if you listen closely in the dead of a cold winter night in Jamestown.
Whew, that was a lot. What’s the scariest road, bridge, trail, or tunnel you’ve experienced? The Autopian is asking!
Top graphic image credit: bizoo_n/stock.adobe.com
How come no one’s mentioned SR 17 in California between Los Gatos and Santa Cruz?
I saw the aftermath of a race between two Corvettes one time in the 80s, fiberglass everywhere, few big pieces were left.
Another time a guy I worked with spun out in the rain and sheared a power pole. The pole leaned towards the roadway, one of the next cars came around the corner and the driver was decapitated by the guy wire.
Workmate was sued for wrongful death, until his defense team had the pole location surveyed..turns out the utility had dug the hole two feet too close to the roadway, so charges were dropped.
Thousands take that road every day to get to work, hats off to all of them who make it home.
My wife lived in the Bay area for many years, and drove 17 to Santa Cruz many times, and she says the same. I have only driven it since they widened it to four lanes, and the jury is still out on whether that helped anything or not. To anyone who ever takes that route, prepare your body for full sphincter lock for its entire length. It is a dangerous road traversed at excessive speed by crazy people.
I used to do Watsonville to Fremont for 8 years out of the last 16 I worked. I don’t miss it a bit, but the W123 Mercedes Turbodiesel at least made it bearable.
170k in 9 years. Never once changed the tranny fluid, but it got an oil service every 7 weeks . I ran it to 385k on the original engine .
Old Cooper River bridge in Charleston.
TEXAS. ALL OF IT. Well, not all of Texas in the sense that I’ve not driven every road in the entire state, but all of the driving I’ve ever done in Texas was nothing short of nightmarish. Only the time I lost control driving on ice was scarier, but that may just be because it was more recent…
FRICKING TEXAS scarred me as a young and inexperienced driver with just a learner’s permit trying to get my hours in during a family road trip. I quickly learned to my horror that Texans behind the wheel are completely and utterly unhinged.
The speed limit means nothing to them, it is only decoration, a bit of old-world anachronistic suggestion like how touristy areas give their stores too many “E”s, a la “Ye Olde Curiositie Shoppe,” and is completely disregarded. The real speed limit in Texas is however far you can push the pedal down, or 10 mph faster than your car can actually go as evidenced by the truck-driving psychopath tailgating you.
The rules of merging or changing lanes in Texas are “Do it as much as and whenever you want to without looking or signaling, regardless of whether the person next to you has any room to get out of the way.” I was very nearly pancaked between two cars on the highway because of this rule, and had to panic brake to avoid it, causing much honking and road rage from the truck-driving psychopath behind me.
And the real kicker, the devious twisted irony of it all, is that it’s infectious. The madness will consume you just as easily, you are not immune, the only true way to cope with the automotive anarchy that is Texas is to BECOME it. Gripped by terror, some kind of primitive survival instinct overcame me, and I haphazardly careened through the nearest exit ramp with reckless abandon, cut across four lanes of traffic without looking, froze upon hearing the terrified screams of my family, jumped a curb, parked diagonally in a McDonalds parking lot, and then came to a unanimous agreement with my family that I would no longer be driving in Texas for the remainder of the trip.
This was many years ago, and since then I have found myself thinking occasionally that “Texas seems pretty cool, I can vibe with some Texas culture, I could see myself living th-” and then I have vivid flashbacks of unbridled mortal terror and hug my knees and start rocking back and forth saying “There’s no place like home! There’s no place like home!” and forget my delusions that Texas was any place suitable for human life.
Driving in Texas… NEVER AGAIN!!! All Texans should have their drivers licenses revoked for their own good. Only God knows what drove them to such madness, but I tell you, it ain’t natural whatever it is.
Its all fun and games till you hear wierd shit for miles then realise it’s a firetruck w lights on going slightly slower than the flow of traffic.
Driving my ’91 Geo Metro over Guanella pass between Grant & Georgetown in a snowstorm at night back in ’04. Noticed the road on a map and thought “what the hell.” Headed up there and then the snow started. By the time I hit some switchbacks visibility dipped. All I could do is not focus on the darkness at the edge of the road and maintain momentum to keep from getting stuck while not going too fast to avoid loosing traction. A couple hours later I popped out the other end.
That was the 2nd stupidest thing I’ve done in a car. Nobody knew where I was going, I saw no one while out there and the snow kept dumping well after that adventure. It probably would of been a couple days for help to come along had something happened.
Did you miss the “Road not maintained beyond this point” sign at the bottom? It’s pretty easy to miss when it’s covered by snow. The pass has since been paved from top to bottom, so somewhat better now, but can still be really sketchy in bad weather.
Cyclists like it in the summer, so even without snow, you need to be alert, especially in the switchbacks on the Georgetown side.
I did something similar when I was in high school, except I was taking the long route from Ridgeway to Cortez via Norwood, Egnar, and Dove Creek. The road isn’t bad, but I hit it during a storm. I think they closed the highway behind me, because I plowed through a good 12-15 inches of snow (first tracks, rah!) on a road that I only knew I was on because the fog line is marked with really tall reflectors so the plow drivers know where the edge is. Keep it between the reflectors and you’re probably AOK. Didn’t see a car or another living thing besides birds and vegetation for over two hours.
Winter driving in SW CO is no joke, and winter goes through April, or May. Sometimes June.
For me, the old I-93 mess pre-Big Dig in Boston. In particular where traffic from the Tobin bridge came in on one side, then a frighteningly short distance across three lanes of often EXTREMELY fast moving traffic (and being driven by Massholes at that), Storrow Drive exited on the other side.
Always a sphincter-tightener at best, but the worst was the time I got to do it in my university’s *diesel* VW Vanagon (it was donated by an alum) with six big college dudes onboard. A vehicle that did not so much accelerate, but painstakingly hunted down and gathered tiny amounts of speed. Measurable with a sundial. At night.
Second place – my summer in Budapest Hungary, 1991. The highway to Vienna from Budapest in those days was three lanes total for most of it’s length. One lane in each direction, with a shared “suicide lane” for passing in BOTH directions in the middle. In 1991, the roads in Hungary were still mostly Commie cars, and indeed, I owned a Trabant. most of these cars were pretty much flat out at 90km/hr, which meant that the SEMI-TRUCKS were pretty much the fastest things on the highway. And they would pull out and pass slower cars with no fucks given at all. What was that stuff on a big MAN or DAF’s bumper? Slower Trabants. Also interesting to see the aftermath of – when two semis decided to pull out to pass in opposite directions at the same time. Irresistible force meet immovable object at 100km/hr+. Fun!
Yup, Boston traffic has never been for the faint of heart, although the nice thing when you were stuck in traffic on the old central artery (if you got on 93 South from the Tobin) you had a great view of the city. I am still a bit white knuckled on the upper deck of the Tobin, a little less so on rhe bottom deck. The last time I came back from Maine I made the mistake of following Waze’s directions which dropped me on Storrow heading west and some idiot had blocked off two lanes by the Hatch Shell for Ubers and Lifts to drop off for some event – of course I have no idea how these cars were going to get there – I spent 45 minutes to go a mile.
I do think it is kinda funny that right next to the new Zakkn bridge – with all its fancy cable stays is a couple of dull bridges, like the new Jamestown bridge, that parallel the fancy bridge suggesting the cable stays were not needed at all. These additional bridges have the issue you noted a bit better.
Speaking of tough merges, it seemed like every place I was going the last time I was in Kansas City required me to make multiple multi lane shifts as we entered on the leftmost lane and then within a mile having to cross three or four lanes of traffic to get to the right hand exit.
First I need some clarification on what you consider to be a “road” – because if we are talking off road trails, then I have some serious contenders. There’s also a difference between “challenging” and “high consequence” – driving some of the passes in Colorado are not difficult, but they consequence for getting it wrong is significant. Black Bear Pass is a good example of Instagram-bait that pulls in people who should not be there and are too focused on filming to drive the road safely. The Flint Switchbacks in The Maze District of Caynonlands National Park is not technically challenging, but screwing up can result in death, the loss of a vehicle, and many thousands of dollars in recovery costs due to the remote nature of the trail. You have to go to the top of the descent and check for uphill traffic before you start; there are no places to pass on the switchbacks.
Trails with names like Steelbender and Cliffhanger in southern Utah are not hyperbole (I significantly relocated some vehicle parts on Steelbender). Being on the side of a cliff with one (or sometimes two) wheels in the air is not uncommon.
For motorcycles, any road can be deadly if you get it wrong; but Beartooth Pass from Yellowstone Park to Red Lodge, MT is both technically challenging with traffic, deceptive corners, water crossing the road, and vertical drop-offs with no shoulder. Getting one corner wrong would easily be fatal.
In the era of GPS, I suppose that technically, a “road” is any sort of thoroughfare that your navigator tries to get you to turn on to, whether you have any business being there or not.
Ice road on Lake Superior.
Bayfield wi. To Madeline Island (Lapointe Wi)
Supposedly safe but always leave the window open in case…..
https://www.dangerousroads.org/north-america/usa/2012-madeline-islands-winter-ice-road.html
Lippincott Pass Rd into Death Valley from the west. Sketchy, even on a motorcycle. Really rocky and narrow. A super long way down if you make a mistake.
A tad lame, but we climbed Mt. Coolidge in Custer State Park in a Honda Fit.
The entrance was nicely paved, but it turned into dirt with hairpins and no guard rails immediately. Turning around wasn’t an option.
We made our way to the top, blowing the horn at each of the many hairpin corners, and arrived at a magnificent view across the mountains from a parking lot full of giant 4WD SUVs. Just them and one Honda Fit. We took a few photos, but left quickly because we wanted to get the hell down off the mountain. Glad we did it though!
Then there was time my ex and I drove our rental Alfa up into the mountains of Elba and found ourselves on a single path goat trail on yet another mountain. The villagers of the tiny town we had just passed through all came out to help us reverse.
A backroad in co to telluride, dad had to park a full size truck up the side of a hill to let jeeps pass. Wouldn’t be a story if road was wider. As the “requires low range” could be done at that time by a crown vic it was stupid easy.
Black Bear or Imogene?
Imogene looks like I recall but this is early 90s…
Maybe Rico pass? Same part of the world.
Somewhere there exists a photo of me standing in the bed of my Datsun 720 truck on Rico pass, circa 1987/88. The vertical cut in the snow from plowing was still over my head. It was May.
Sounds about right for May, I was at the top of Imogene in July last year when the ‘dozers finally arrived from Telluride to fully open the road.
2001, Cambodia, Battambong to Phnom phen. 8 hours in bed of a supercab toyota pickup with 14 people; 6 in the cab, 8 in the bed with everyone’s luggage.I sat on the back corner, one foot in the bed, the other on the back bumper, on some of the worst roads I have ever seen in my life. Holes in bridges that could disappear a scooter, more pothole than road. I would not do that again if someone paid me… 🙂
Ridge Ave in Evanston as a new driver when cars were still huge. Utterly terrifying.
Ice road on the sea ice, it was dark and I got lost when wind had blown all the snow away so everything I could see was just clear ice which was pitch black in the darkness.
Damn.
I wasn’t driving, but for most terrifying passenger situation, it’s a toss-up between a particular taxi ride in Moscow (clapped out cab, maniacal driver and old ladies running across the road because the drivers don’t yield to pedestrians) or the bus ride from Sorrento to Amalfi (very windy and the driver doesn’t slow down for blind turns–just lays on the horn).
We took the ferry back to Sorrento, which was a great decision. So relaxing in comparison and the views of Positano and all the other settlements along the water were amazing.
Paterson Pass Road. A perfectly lovely country winding road through the hills south of the Altamont and I580 . The thing is that it is primarily a farm road for a few people who live on it and although it is two way, it’s only one lane wide. The problem part is that if there is some traffic tie up on 580 ie always, the various navigation apps divert traffic to it. It is surprising how few drivers know how to drive in those conditions. Add a random 18 wheel truck and an occasional 30 foot wide tractor to the mix and it’s a real mess.
I totally enjoyed that ride back in the late 70s on my KH 400 2 stroke Triple..in a car, not so much.
Yeah, it was one of my favorite roads. Not now.
Mine involve fog. (1) Southwest England, Dartmoor, I think. On a motorcycle, dense fog, nearing sunset, narrow road, no markings, numerous curves. Had to follow a car whose taillights I could barely see. (2) I-35 between Des Moines and Minneapolis. In a van. Very thick fog. Had to tailgate a semi, hoping he could see where the hell the road was. (3) Beartooth Pass, WY/MT. In a van. Super thick fog/clouds, very wiggly, no one to follow.
Oh, and one that didn’t involve fog, which made it scary because I could see the chaos around me: Liuzhou, China, on a section of undivided four-lane highway that drivers in everything from scooters to semis were pretending was six lanes.
Reading this in rural Mexico, on the Nayarit peninsula. Not the scariest roads I’ve driven, but probably some of the most sustained and consistently sketchy road infrastructure I’ve seen. Potholes the size of wheelbarrows, random, citizen-built speedbumps that will launch anything lighter than a 1-ton truck, and cobblestone “paving” that can only make dentists and chiropractors smile. And the locals drive like they’re at Darwin’s science fair.
Side note: my rental is an Indian-built Hyundai … something … it says i10 on the back? It’s a tiny shitbox, the 3rd gear synchro is out and it shakes like a caffeinated chihuahua, but with full walk-away LDW it’s actually the perfect car for navigating this environment.
Scariest I have personally driven: Slea Head Road in Ireland. It’s where they did the Luke Skywalker scenes in one of the new Star Wars movies. It’s amazing, but it’s hard to see the scenery because the road is basically one lane, both ways. And it’s on a cliff. And you may have to back up hundreds of yards to find space to pass an oncoming vehicle. But there’s a farm that has alpacas you can go pet!
Scariest I have ever been a passenger on: Lima, Peru. Just… anywhere. Everyone drives like they’re the protagonist in a GTA game. When making a right turn, you’ll be cut off from the left by another car trying to beat you to the turn. And by a motorcycle on the right, because it looks like there’s almost enough space to squeeze by. Stop signs are for chumps. Ditto red lights. Lane lines are summarily ignored and driving in oncoming lanes is omnipresent. It’s nonstop madness, and everyone is blaring their horns at everyone else, as though *any of them* is not to blame. Hell, my flight out was delayed by almost two hours because the traffic was *so bad* that the flight crew couldn’t get to the airport.
Sounds kinda like my experience driving in Texas. I do not envy you.
Only difference is Texas still *wants* you to have working catalytic converters. The air quality in Peru is godawful. Like breathing in a roomful of lawnmowers. And at altitude, it’s even worse.
That’s a good point… It’s hard enough to breathe at high altitude when the air quality is good as-is, can’t be fun when you’re breathing fumes AND the air is thin.
Ironically, the farther you get from the major cities, the worse it gets, because the proportion of scooters, ATVs and motorcycle-based tuk-tuks increases dramatically.
If “traveled” includes walking, I’m going with the R478 in Pollboy, near the Cliffs of Moher in Ireland this past spring. We hiked north from the Visitor Center along the ridge of the cliff – in and itself a sketchy walk – up to the Pollboy Lookout, and mistakenly thought that the trail was a loop and we’d work our way back to the car park. Instead, we ended up at a dead end near some agricultural facilities next to this road, about a kilometer from where we parked. So I hopped the fence an started walking south. The distance was easy, but what made it sketchy were two things; the blind curves packed into such a short distance, the lack of shoulders on the road, and the tour buses. I made it to the car park – as did the other dad who met the same fate and made the same trek down the road. Grabbed the car, ran back up to my starting point – where there was no parking or shoulder – hurriedly got the family on board, and drove north a bit further until I could find a turn around point to head back to our accommodations.
Once you get off the motorways in Ireland, the roads can get pretty sketchy, with blind curves, hedges, and no shoulders. Those ubiquitous tour buses gave me the confidence to drive places I might not have otherwise driven with our little rental car.
I had the misfortune of meeting and oncoming car on a long, single-lane country bridge in the dark somewhere outside of Killarney. I had to back up, and the backup cam was useless. Because there was NO light at all, outside of the moon, and it was November, so it was cloudy. My mirrors were almost as useless as the backup camera. How I didn’t ping-pong off the stone walls of the bridge, I’ll never know. But I was damn close the whole time. I don’t know how far I had to back up, maybe 50 yards. But it felt like 50 miles.
At the Dublin Airport, the drop off area adjacent to where we picked up our rental car was full of cars with broken left-hand wing mirrors. “How does that happen?” I wondered to myself. The trip out to the cliffs a few days later answered that question. It is very harrowing to be on a narrow two-lane road with rock walls and encountering oncoming full-sized trucks. The drive back to Greystones, most of it on very dark roads on a night with no moon, was also challenging, but at least there were no trucks. Our car’s mirror managed not to get damaged.
Nigeria .
12 years ago.
Late night, headed from the Abuja airport to the “hotel” where we stayed on our overnights ( night stops in their vernacular).The company owned Kia van would pick us up in front of the airport and six of us would pile in with our bags in the back.I always chose the back seat as it was less scary.The ride would start with horn blowing to clear everything ( people and chickens,dogs etc ). The horn seems to be directly related to the radio as every time would blow the horn he’d turn the radio up till it was full tilt,even then he’d blow the horn whenever passing any car and still touch the radio knob.
Other than the road conditions which were horrible ,other drivers who drive like it’s a personal affront that others are in front of them, the real scary part was knowing that at any moment we would be stopped by the local police and be required to pay a
“fee” for using the road.
Which meant us all getting out and being searched even though they knew full well we were a flight crew.More than once there it cost me every thing I had on me.After the first time I only carried twenty USD on overnights.
This happened to us 2 times till our company got smart and hired a local company to provide an armed escort to guard us. I swear it was the same “cops” that were stopping us before .
That in my opinion is a scary road.
Funny but scary side note, when we would get into Abuja at night there was always a armed guard equipped with a hand painted stock AK-47 sleeping under a 727 we parked next to.The next morning he would still be sleeping there.Im not sure what he was guarding.
Another scary story from Nigeria, My driver and I were rear ended by a cheap Chinese knockoff motorcycle ( okada or motorcycle taxi) on my way to the airport in Lagos on a Sunday morning.
My driver immediately jumped out , started swearing at the guy who was laying on the ground holding his knee.His bike had a smashed front rim and both forks bent back.
Next thing I know my driver is putting the boots to the guy, pounding the crap outta him. I look around ,of course there’s a crowd forming and I’m standing there in my uniform surrounded by people who aren’t happy .I grabbed him and we left.Never heard a word about it.
Same road ,about a month later I was walking along and I watched two guys fighting over a parking spot at the soccer field,one reached in his trunk ,hauled out a tire iron and hit the other guy square in the side of the head with it .
Tonk!
it was unreal.
It sounded like he hit a pumpkin ,surprisingly they guy didn’t go down.I always wondered who won that fight as I wasn’t sticking around to find out.
That was a scary road.
I lasted ten months there in Nigeria
I finally had enough and quit .
Luck I got another job back in the states the next month.
A few months later this happened to that airline.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dana_Air_Flight_0992
I knew three of the crew members on that flight and have pictures of me flying that same plane.
Scariest roads and skies I’ve ever experienced.
That is certifiably bonkers. Glad you got out before the crash
I’ll go with New Delhi, India. Went over there for a week long work trip about 15 years ago. The hotel was several miles from the office, so they arranged for a van to transport us. I thought it would be fun to see the traffic so I called dibs on the front passenger seat.
After the third day, I had to move to one of the back seats. The chaos was just too much overload.
There wasn’t much for sidewalks, so we were sharing the roadway with massive trucks, motorcycles, bikes, pedestrians and cows. It wasn’t uncommon to see mopeds with three or four people on them, and the little three wheeled tuk tuks with as many as ten. Four way stops were a free for all – signage was ignored, and some days there were traffic cops directing traffic and some there weren’t.
Along the highway there signs saying “Lane driving is safe driving”. People obeyed that about as much as they obeyed the speed limits.
I only observed one severe accident (a subcompact ran into the back end of a truck at a pretty high speed – pretty sure there had to have been fatalities), and I think we took out a moped at one point (heard it more than saw it; we didn’t stop).
By the end of the week I just closed my eyes and prayed whenever we got in that van.
Oh, there have been a few, some situational, some just because they’re always terrible:
US 40 through southern PA and northeastern MD while towing a car hauler
US 52 through northeastern Iowa during a white-out snowstorm
The 710 freeway in Long Beach at rush hour
The ring road around Willemstad, Curacao (INSANE drivers)
Banbury Road, Oxford, England (sooo many bicycles)
Pikes Peak, in a Jeep Scrambler, back when it was still gravel
Honorable mention, just for sheer creepiness, even though it’s flat and level: California Highway 223, south of Bakersfield
SR 223 connects SR 58 to Interstate 5. Lots of it is flat, but if you come from Tehachapi past the railroad loop, hang a left and take it. You get a magnificent view of the south end of the Central Valley before you drop into Arvin.
We used to come home that way when we had a rental in Tehachapi, it was always the route of choice.
“US 40 through southern PA and northeastern MD while towing a car hauler”
Honorable mention from my personal history: 101 in Los Angeles, at rush hour, in a painfully slow Iveco-based Barth RV, made even slower by the MkIV Jetta on a tow dolly behind it. Do. NOT. Recommend.
I’ve got nothing on the road, but can we all just pause for a moment to revel in how awesome that random 80s themed white box SUV is in the main photo?
Imagine that style and simplicity with todays better… well could be better, electronics and mechanicals?
That there is a Toyota BJ73 Prado. Cheap and easy imports.
Careful, you almost got your gearhead card clipped there for not IDing the Land Cruiser
Scariest road? I guess that would be the Sunshine Skyway Bridge, during a big storm, back around 1984. This bridge is a bit spooky, even on a clear day. I wasn’t petrified, but I kept both hands on the wheel and kept telling myself everything would be fine…. lol
A very specific road experience, though I don’t know exactly where it was:
In the mid ‘90s I travelled from the UK to visit Polish relatives who had a holiday cottage in the countryside a couple of hours drive south of Gdansk. At the time, East Germany and Poland were still deep in their post Iron Curtain hangover, so infrastructure was either completely derelict or in the middle of being demolished to be replaced by something shiny and new.
West German autobahns lived up to their reputation in every way: fast, smooth roads with long sections where you could hit triple digits on the speedo (in both mph and mph) if you were so inclined. Even at night, in fairly heavy rain, I was nudging an ill-advised ton on traffic-free stretches.
East German autobahns, on the other hand, were an altogether different experience: massive potholes, mud and gravel smeared across the carriageway by the farmers that pulled directly across both lanes, oblivious to the British guy barreling towards them with his wipers going flat out. I narrowly avoided the tractor by ducking onto the shoulder by the median, only to discover that it ended abruptly about 60yds later with a huge cement block.
After dodging that bullet I decided that it was time to get off the motorway and find somewhere to stay for the night. Fortunately there was an exit with a small town coming up about a half mile later, so I backed off the gas and pulled onto the off-ramp. Just as I touched the brakes, the road surface switched to cobblestones, not known for their traction when wet and muddy, so as I slid down the ramp I completed a completely involuntary 360° spin at about 50mph, sliding sideways through the intersection at the bottom and finally getting things back under control across the street from a charming little hotel that served excellent vodka.
You just may need to change your name to Clark Griswald …lol