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My first foray into Porsches was two years ago when I picked up a tired 1990 911 C4. I bought cheap and paid later. It was a fun project that I learned a lot through, which included an engine drop in the garage for a reseal plus a lot of while you're in there. I panicked at the beginning of the pandemic and sold anything that was worth something. Several months later, once I got a little more comfortable with where things were, I missed having a canyon, fun car. This was August roughly and aircooled prices were through the roof. I figured I'd get a 996 as a hold me over car which is detailed in this build thread:
I thoroughly enjoyed that car and was leaning towards keeping it long term but deep down, I wanted my next car to be something that I'd want as a permanent part of my future car collection. As fun and competent a car the 996 was, it wasn't the right fit for permanent car material and I would've had to put a lot more money into it to get it perfect (namely, paint). So, for the past several weeks, I flipped back and forth whether I should pick up a 73 RS(R) tribute build or a GT3. Finding one was difficult but I managed to find one with 26K miles through another forum member. I flew out to Louisville on Tuesday and picked her up:
And since I've never road tripped across the country before, nor bought a car that wasn't local and drove it back, I had a few things with work across the country that lined up well and so I decided to road trip back:
Congratulations. Beautiful ride! My first 911 was a 1990 C4, Guards Red. Then went to a 1996 993 C2, then finally to the GT3 in 2007.
For me, the GT3 was the end point, having put over 135K miles on it (so far). I hope you find as long lasting a connection as I have with your new car.
My original plans were to spend the night in Louisville, get a chance to explore the city and then head out to Kansas City the next morning, but my friends were going to be in Park City this weekend to ride mountain bikes. So, I decided to get a quick meal after picking up the car and make the 500 mile trek over to Kansas City.
After that, I left a little later than I was hoping at 7pm ET but landing at 4pm, getting/paying for a car and eating was foolishly optimistic to happen in less than a couple hours. I hit the freeway and was amazed at how nice it was between Louisville (well, maybe not Kentucky but definitely Indiana and south IL) and St. Louis. I had to keep checking the cluster as I'd unexpectedly creep up to 115 without realizing. First two hours was hard not to stretch it's legs so the first tank only lasted about 250 miles. Going into this, I was very concerned about the suspension stiffness and whether or not I'd instantly regret trying to road trip a GT3 over 2,000 miles. However, immediately outside of Louisville with it's pock marked freeway, it was pretty clear that the suspension was not too far off from Ohins. I honestly have no idea how people find this suspension harsh. My 964 with PSS10 (9s?) was harsh and every bump in the road you'd clench your butt cheeks.
Roads through Indiana and south Illinois were quite pleasant:
2nd fuel stop and it looks like I picked up quite a few passengers along the way:
After about six and a half hours or so I made it into Kansas City. I'm glad I opted to pick up the bucket seats as they fit me perfectly and I only had to shift around a few times in the seat (as opposed to any other car where my *** seems to go numb after an hour). These ones are full leather but even with AC on, back was sweaty. I wasn't very fond of my perlon inserts on my other pair of bucket seats but now fully appreciate them, so those seats will be going back in once I get back.
Day 1 in the books. Next two days are in Kansas City for work.
Congrats, sounds pretty perfect! I too was torn between a hotrod long hood, and a 996gt3. Ended up finding a long hood RS/R, which I’m still very much tooling with (engine rebuild underway). I’ve since located a 6/gt3 that I’d like to purchase! Then it will simply be time to add miles.
Congratulations. I have also recently just picked up a Basalt Black GT3 and it’s a nice colour in the right lighting. Please carry on with your road trip updates across the US so that I can live vicariously through you!
I have also recently just picked up a Basalt Black GT3 and it’s a nice colour in the right lighting.
Yeah, I hadn't seen this color in person before and I was pretty tired of having black cars so I was intending to wrap it. But, when I saw it in direct sunlight, it looks fantastic so I'm pretty sure I'll keep it unwrapped.
Coming into Kansas City Tuesday night, I messaged an acquaintance that I met about 4 or 5 years back when I rode bikes with their group for a couple weeks. He was gracious enough to lend me a bike for a group ride on Wednesday (I had MTB kit with me since the plan was to ride dirt in Park City for the weekend, but whatever, a ride is a ride). So, I checked into my hotel (Hotel Kansas City) around 1am Wednesday morning and then visited a client Wednesday. Wednesday afternoon I made it down to Overland Park to do their Wednesday group ride. It was a sweltering 90ish degrees and 50% humidity but it was great to be out with people on the bike. I'm in fairly decent form right now and couldn't make much of a dent on the ride, so it seems Zwift has helped close the bridge in spring fitness between the west coast and mid America (ride link here: https://www.strava.com/activities/5482842512).
Somehow I didn't manage to get any pictures of the ride or beers afterwards, but Wednesday was a great evening.
Jump forward to Thursday evening, I left KC and headed out through Kansas. Kansas was mild rolling hills but without much forest/tree coverage:
Unfortunately, I got popped with a ticket doing 90 a few hours outside of KC. The officer wasn't happy that I didn't have plates either and wrote me up for that as well, which is a misdemeanor in Kansas. I need to call the court house tomorrow (Monday) to sort that out. Should I contact one of the ticket attorneys to deal with it? Overall, failure on my part for not securing a radar detector while in Kansas City (I did order one prior to my trip but Amazon failed to deliver on time).
After that, I set the cruise control to the speed limit and drove that way all the way to Denver...a bit of a damper on the mood. Around 11pm I called a few hotels to get rates with the plan on calling right before I get in town to see which would discount the rate the most. I was hoping to stay in Deer Creek at one of the high end resorts so that I could have a nice place to work for the morning before I head to Park City. However, that plan backfired on me since every hotel I contacted at 11pm had higher rates at 2am and wouldn't budge on price. I ended up at the Maven a the Dairy Block at 2am, tired and a bit annoyed since my expected $240 room turned into a $400 room with parking for 6 hours of sleep and a shower. The room was a typical hipster boutique hotel in that price range. Food selection though was pretty good so at least that took a little of the sting.
Apologies for the delay in getting this up, you'll understand later in the post why. I spent the day in Denver, mostly working and taking conference calls at the hotel and in the lobby. Once I wrapped up, I headed out to Best Buy to pick up a radar detector...something that I should have done while in Kansas City but did not realize BB stocks them (and I really wanted a Valentine), but the best radar detector is the one you have with you I guess.
Escort 360 was their only high end option available, wanted a Uniden R7 which showed as in stock but was out of stock in the store. Anyway, set it up and hit the road for Park City to ride mountain bikes with the friends. I had a few ways to go to Park City, interstates to the south and north and 40 West through the mountains. Obviously twisties were the answer. But, I had to endure an hour of bumper to bumper traffic to get to the twisties:
Traffic as far as the eye can see:
At least I'm not getting tired of seeing the spoiler in the side mirror:
Thought I'd be clever and take side roads...so did everyone else...at least it was scenic:
After an hour or so of bumper to bumper (and fortunately car water temp holding rock steady...man I was glad I wasn't in an aircooled car right then) I embarked in a mountain climb starting at 8K feet above sea level and most of the 40 looked like this:
I stopped in Steamboat Springs to get a meal, which ended up being fantastic, a local restaurant named Laundry:
Yes...I ate all of that...yes I am a fatass at heart.
All was good at this point. Had a good meal in my stomach and had roughly 300 miles to go to Park City. Google ETA was 5.5 hours but I was doing a pretty consistent 70+ through so I figured it was closer to 4 hours. That's when disaster struck at 8pm just outside of Craig Colorado. Rear tire blew out. I called a tow truck, explained what car I had and to bring a flat bed. He said he wasn't sure he could get my car onto his flat bed so he was going to first bring out air. I asked if he had any sealant and he said no, but he'd stop by O'Reilly's and pick up some. Wow, that's awfully nice. Anyway, hour later he arrives and the sealant shoots out the other side of the tire. He calls the competing tow truck company to bring the wrecker and wheel carrier thing. By around 11pm he comes out and realizes he can't get anything under the car. So, at this point it's clear I'm in for a fun 24 hours and will need to leave the car on a dirt county highway for the night:
I didn't end up getting to sleep until 1am the night before...kinda sorta my fault though since the hotel clerk was a car guy and was trying to figure out options while we talked about cars. I forgot to mention in the previous post, but the original tow guy, Bruce, suggested getting a tire from somewhere and he'd lend me a car. He also offered to take me to the airport if needed. The next morning I started my day early and began calling every tire shop within a 200 mile radius to see if they had any 295s in stock (along with a list of like 5 sizes that could be stretched on)...nope. Welp, call Lee, the other tow guy to pick me up and bring the flat bed. There was a 1pm flight from Hayden that I wanted to get onto but after starting the process of getting the car onto the bed, that was becoming increasingly optimistic:
After a couple hours total, we had the car onto the bed and headed back to Craig. I bought Lee lunch at a local Mexican hole in the wall and then he drove me to the airport. And of course, that wasn't smooth sailing either as Denver was experiencing severe thunderstorms so I was stuck in Hayden for over an hour and then two further hours in Denver. But, at least this took a little of the edge off:
That was at Root Down. They had Thomas Handy Rye and the above Pappy Family Reserve so as a final farewell to this trip, I decided to get both. I was originally supposed to get back home around 9pm but didn't get home until 1am.
06-19-2021, 01:05 PM
Ryan's Basalt Black 6GT3
