It was meant to be a celebration, an epic journey that said everything about who we are as a magazine and everything we represent. This was, after all, C! Magazine's 5th year anniversary and we wanted to do something very special, so we set out to create the ultimate enthusiast's guide to Europe's dream driving destinations. Technically speaking, we don't hit 5 years until February of next year; internally, however, it was around this time when the magazine was born, so it made the perfect excuse.

The plan was for three of us to make the pilgrimage to Europe, and then drive from Germany to France, Switzerland, Italy, Monaco, Spain and then back to Germany to do some flying laps of the enigmatic Nuerburgring.

Every detail was painfully combed through. Ken, our publisher, had printed out maps that plotted out our routes carefully, complete with stop over points and times of day to travel. He had print outs of the average temperature forecasts in seven major cities, plus the rainfall in Italy during this time of the year as well as the GNP of Bangladesh just in case. Nothing was left to chance.

We were planning to cover around 5 thousand kilometers in two weeks, so no detail was deemed too trivial. We knew where we were going to stay and when; how much these places cost; where the nearest fire exits were – we even had a roster system set up as to who's turn it was to steal the little soaps in the hotel, just so there were no arguments. We used a fantastic travel software that tallied up all the toll rates along the way and even gave us an exact amount we would spend on fuel. It was perfect. Too perfect.

Then it happened.

Somebody at BMW, presumably with the German name equivalent of 'Murphy' got just as excited as us and gave us a couple of their top shelf items a week or so in advance. Audi also threw in an 8-cylinder forbidden fruit into the pie. Very kind of them, sure. Problem was, we had computed our fuel figures based on a compact, 4-cylinder, diesel job; these fire-breathing beasts were only meant to be picked up a week after so we could drive them from Munich up to the Nuerburgring. Not throughout the continent.

Dilemma. Now we were faced with the temptation of driving three high performance sports cars that drank more than the entire Rolling Stones did on tour. Thing is, even though we had no obligation to pick these cars up straight away, I knew we were screwed.

Just as I suspected, we picked up the cars anyway. We then sat in an Agip gas station on the outskirts of Munich sharing a Baguette with cheese, staring out at the problematic precious metal that was parked neatly in front of us. Kevin Limjoco, editor at large (with emphasis on large) had the almighty BMW M6 with 507hp being pumped out of ten massive cylinders; Ken had the Bavarian slingshot, the M roadster, kitted out with the last generation's M3 6-cylinder powerplant that spat out a staggering 343hp when taunted. I had Audi's awesome S4 with 340 precious horses being called up from a super sharp six speed manual box. Then there was the original A4 2.0 turbo diesel, of course, which sat quietly neglected in our hotel's car park..

After chewing the little problem over, Ken put it on the table. “It's simple, boys. I say we stick to the plan. We park up the three guzzlers and take the diesel to save on fuel. If we take all three cars, we won't be able to eat. We would blow all our budget on gas.” There was a silence so deep that we could almost hear the thoughts that passed through each others heads. We all knew that this would mean one meal a day at most, and that would no doubt have a Mc prefix affixed to it.

Isn't it ironic. Who of us would have guessed, during those first few years at C! When we were scrambling to borrow anything just to feature, that five years later we would be faced with such a problem. Instead of figuring how to get such wonderful cars, we were figuring out how to store them. With that in mind, I stood up dramatically, walked up to the window, gazed out intensely at the cars basking vainly in the soft light from an early evening, mid-spring sunset, and said, “Well, gentlemen, we're not a food magazine, right?”

Without another word, we all got up and jumped into our respective cars and drove off.

Anyone with a blood rating of 98 octane or higher would have done the same. After all, how could we face ourselves ever again had we taken the practical way out. We complain constantly about our roads and the malnutritioned engine variants we normally get palmed off over here and yet when faced with the opportunity to drive three incredible cars on equally incredible, unrestricted roads, we complain about the cost of fuel. It would be like an athlete finally making it to the Olympics and not competing because he didn't want to spend for new shoes and the registration fee.

Sure there were sacrifices, but the hunger pangs were soon drowned out by the delicious sounds of each of these finely crafted engines sucking up huge amounts of sweet mountain air, while cruising at 280 km/h on the autobahn and burning up the euro equivalent of a happy meal every couple of kilometers. Sure we could have driven frugally, but I refer you to the previous paragraph. Besides, once you see the unrestricted speed sign on a four lane blacktop, it almost screams, “Last one to the end is a rotten Schnitzel.”

There were even a couple of times when we had to drive through the night just to save on hotel bills. Some days, I would ask for extra napkins at the gas stations, because if you tore them up into little circles and soaked them in Ketchup, you could fool your self that it was Gnocchi. All the while our pampered ponies would sip through 15,000 pesos a day of Black Label fuel. There were times I almost cracked, sure, but I remained strong. I knew I could probably throw a fit and get the publisher to spring for a meal – but it was the three meals a day after that that I worried about. Besides, it was character building and it taught me a lot, like, how many carbohydrates there are in a drinks coaster.

We braved the hunger pangs and the odd Department of Roads and Highways sponsored hotel rooms and finally made it back to Munich after 5,000 incredible kilometers. All of which you will read about in upcoming issues. We huddled over my lap top and poured through the photos of the last two weeks and realized we had accomplished more on this trip than even we had thought was possible. There were cheers and tears as we absorbed the magnitude of what we had achieved. This time it was Ken who stood up, with a tear glistening in his eye, he gazed out at the car park and said, “Tonight, we eat.”