IRNM4N's ED Experience

[IRNM4N]

Ok, I am finally back (at least mentally) from our ED adventure. This was one of the most memorable and amazing experiences of our lives to date and definitely one that will be near impossible to top. I will try and keep this car-centric, although the cities, people and cuisine were out of this world as well.

I am actually going to start this journal the day before we left as Dustin (Feckinspaceman) invited me to the BMW Golf and Drive event at TPC Tampa Bay on Friday 4/24.

We arrived to the course Friday morning, not sure what to expect. WOW. We were treated to a morning golf clinic (FORE!) and then were basically handed the keys to several amazing cars with a map with simple instructions to be back in about 10-15 min on each run. Cool part was that our group started as 17 people, but since our driving portion was right after lunch, there was only about 6-8 there. We got to repeatedly drive the cars we were interested in. I drove the m4, m6 coupe and Alpina B6. Needeless to say, there was a lot of Tampa Police presence on the roads a couple hours later!







Dustin hitting the long ball!



Now for the trip...

We departed from Tampa, FL on 4/25 to arrive in Munich on the 26th which was my 33rd birthday. Running on next to zero sleep was actually not that bad due to the adrenaline running through my veins. We were picked up by the Sixt 7er limo free of charge which brought us to our hotel, the LeMeridien which was across the street from the main train station in downtown. Location turned out to be perfect for sightseeing/getting around.



After hitting some coffee and changing into some clean clothes, we headed directly to BMW Welt to do the Museum. If you ever get the opportunity, do not skip this (or the factory tour which I will detail). Both were amazing.







After the museum, we needed a bite so we headed to Hofbrauhaus. Super cool. Our waiter got mad at a bunch of other tourist who came in and totally refused to serve them. Cannot do that here for sure!





Delivery day!...

I woke up at 5 without an alarm as to be expected after my 18 years of waiting to take delivery of this car. When I was 15, I was working as an intern to and intern for a minor league hockey team and when I went offsite with the Director of Marketing, he pulled up in his brand new e36 red m3. I literally asked the guy what he went to college for. Hence my undergrad degree in Marketing lol.

The premium lounge is as advertised. We ate there 3 times that day and they kept changing items up.





I resisted temptation to look at the car until "the moment" and am glad I did. Thankfully my wife was there to go take tons of pictures from the 3rd floor. at 10:10, it was finally my time and the delivery was awesome. My delivery specialist went over the entire car with me and took her time as I am not used to having ANY of these tech goodies coming from an 04 S2000. So Beautiful...



I was given both the Harmon Kardon bluetooth speaker and the voucher for the stopwatch as gifts. After a couple victory laps (so slow lol) and a few pics outside, we headed out for a couple pics and then immediately down to the Welt garage to apply a quick wax coat for the trip.It was cool to have people taking pics of MY car for once!





I was also given a nice BMW keychain that they engraved for free in the gift shop.



The wife even got in the spirit!



After securing the car, we headed up to the lounge for a while to snack and then set out for the Plant Tour. Again, DO NOT skip this if you have never done it. It was amazing to see the precision and technology that goes into building our vehicles. I was able to see an M4 on the line at almost all stages of production. So cool!



We hung out in Munich that evening then rested up for the rest of our adventure. The next day we set out for Neuschwanstein Castle for the obligatory pic. It did not disappoint!



From there we headed south through Austria, Switzerland and then into Italy for a few days around Lake Como. One day and four countries. That may be a hard one to beat, but I will certainly try!







Thankfully my hotel (Villa Floria Lake Como) had secure parking. While the roads in Germany and Switzerland were the best I have ever driven on, the "roads" in Italy were quite the opposite. Thankfully BMW's insurance was in place to fix the curb rash and to calm the nerves when trucks were passing on two lane roads barely big enough for one car...

Not a bad view!



The next day we drove up to Mennagio to take a boat out for a few hours. We were so amazed to actually find parking that we totally forgot to pay the meter! Ooops! I guess ill see that ticket in a year from what I read.



Lake Como is so beautiful. It was cold out and overcast, but it was awesome none the less... The boat had a carbon dash too haha!



Bond villa...





The next day we drove over to Bellagio. What a cool town. I could barely keep up with the locals on the roads as I felt there was going to be a dump truck coming around every turn to take us out. Once I can finally edit the GoPro Videos I shot all week I will post the You Tube link.





I was definitely feeling very blessed, so we stepped into a church that was over 1000 years old to give thanks.





That night we drove over to Lugano, Switzerland for dinner. Really cool city. Roads are great and people are some of the nicest I have ever met.

We had reservations at an awesome restaurant that was affiliated with a hotel. Parking nearby was nonexistent, so I pulled up to the front door of the hotel to ask about parking. The guy at the front desk told me to "just leave the car there" and his guys will park it and then I can call and they will pick us up... This was only my 3rd day with the car and that was not happening. I asked if he could just show me where to park it and he literally hopped in my back seat (poor guy) and fond me a spot. He said "It has been a long time since I have been crushed like a sardine!" Haha! When we left the dinner it was raining and they let me use an umbrella to go get the car. When I tried to return it, they said to keep it as a souvenir.

Friday morning we set out for Nice, France. The drive was highlighted by a two hour traffic jam upon reaching the Mediterranean. Once it opened up I tried to keep up with the locals... I am sure there a re a couple tickets coming from this section. I stopped in a "rest stop" to get some coffee and used the facilities and it was a madhouse. I even curbed my wheel trying to navigate the insane amount of cars in the small space and the tight areas.

The plan originally was to drop the car at TT Transit that day, but May 1 is a huge holiday over there and I thankfully was able to reschedule for Monday before our flight. Even the "American Car Wash" was closed. We ended up using the manual wash at the airport and just parking the car in the garage for the weekend.









Nice, France is such a great city. We had heard how the people could be rough on americans and unhelpful, but we found it to be quite to opposite. We hung there and checked out the sights and used the train to shoot to Monaco on Sunday, but unfortunately (for my wife) most of the shops were closed. The F1 race is this coming weekend, so it was cool to see the course set up, but it made the city a little hard to get around in down by the course.







Did see a few Vettes over there...







Finally it was time to head back. I dropped the car at TT transit Monday morning and there were a couple other f8x cars there. I also managed to curb my other wheel trying to get out of the parking garage (RRRRRGH!)... Thankfull BMW has already confirmed that both will be repaired or replaced at the VPC before releasing to the Performance Center for Re-Delivery.









This week has been extremely difficult to get back to reality. We are already planning out next ED although it will be a couple years with the wife's car. Once you do this, there is literally NO other way if buying new. I am sorry if this was pic intensive, but trying to narrow down from over 2500 was difficult. I will pick this up once the car hits the boat then the PC.

So happy to be a part of the family finally!!! Thanks to everyone for all the info over the past year to help us make this a reality and to Rudy (Azula) for hooking me up with my CA, Adam Feinstein at BMW of Turnersville. His customer service is second to none and we are definitely customers for life.

- Chris

[BMW F22]

Great report and pix!! I agree that ED is the only way to buy a new BMW.

[oobopzo0]

Congrats!~

[GOLFFRR]

awesome! congrats and thank you for posting I always enjoy the ed trip post

[LindsayEOD]

Congrats Chris. Make sure to get more pics of that color combo once it arrives in your garage!

[Bluex]

Fantastic! I love reading these......yours is probably the final ED journal i'll read before I head over in just a few days myself. My itinerary is mostly different from yours (German Castles), except for Neuschwanstein, but I really enjoyed the diversity of your photos. The church shot was great.

Congratulations!

[IRNM4N]

Lindsay- PM me your email and Ill shoot you the link to my photobucket. These are only some of the iPhone pics. All the good camera shots were in the raw and were too large to post... Combo is deadly!!!

Originally Posted by LindsayEOD

Congrats Chris. Make sure to get more pics of that color combo once it arrives in your garage!

[IRNM4N]

Awesome! I look forward to your pics. I can't wait to go back. Next time I will head north and do the ring, etc and then down to the passes (were closed this time of year) and then drop the car back in MCH and rent a small car or take trains. The food there is amazing if you are into that. Completely blew the budget, but racked up 5 more Michelin Stars on the trip. Even the street food was killer. I wonder now how people from over there feel when coming to the US. I live in FL where it is tourist central and the beached are beautiful, but after that there is nothing to look at. Have a blast man!!!

Originally Posted by Bluex

Fantastic! I love reading these......yours is probably the final ED journal i'll read before I head over in just a few days myself. My itinerary is mostly different from yours (German Castles), except for Neuschwanstein, but I really enjoyed the diversity of your photos. The church shot was great.

Congratulations!

[LindsayEOD]

Originally Posted by IRNM4N

Lindsay- PM me your email and Ill shoot you the link to my photobucket. These are only some of the iPhone pics. All the good camera shots were in the raw and were too large to post... Combo is deadly!!!

Awesome! PM Sent.

[Bluex]

Originally Posted by IRNM4N

Awesome! I look forward to your pics. I can't wait to go back. Next time I will head north and do the ring, etc and then down to the passes (were closed this time of year) and then drop the car back in MCH and rent a small car or take trains. The food there is amazing if you are into that. Completely blew the budget, but racked up 5 more Michelin Stars on the trip. Even the street food was killer. I wonder now how people from over there feel when coming to the US. I live in FL where it is tourist central and the beached are beautiful, but after that there is nothing to look at. Have a blast man!!!

Will do and thanks! I do plan on a nice long pic and video heavy thread upon return

I wanted to do the passes as well, but as you stated, closed.

Plenty of great hotels and restaurants planned

Any specific tips on traveling over there? (my first trip to Germany) When you filled your tank with gas, did you use us based credit cards? Did you travel with and use mostly Euros? Just curious.

[TI.3VOM]

Thanks for the write up! I know it's a lot of work cuz I'm working on mine! Working on reducing the size of all the pics... The Welt was closed when I took delivery (Monday) so thanks for the pics! I was going to go back the next day but I celebrated a little to hard that night and was in no condition to go anywhere the next morning...

[Doctor///M]

Congrats!

Nice write up and agreed on the new car purchase!! ED or nothing!!!

[Dimitri]

Congrats on the new car. I love ED

[IRNM4N]

We got the Capital One Venture One car specifically for this trip as they give a large limit and have no foreign transaction fees. We brought about $500 euro in cash and that was about right.

Originally Posted by Bluex

Will do and thanks! I do plan on a nice long pic and video heavy thread upon return

I wanted to do the passes as well, but as you stated, closed.

Plenty of great hotels and restaurants planned

Any specific tips on traveling over there? (my first trip to Germany) When you filled your tank with gas, did you use us based credit cards? Did you travel with and use mostly Euros? Just curious.

[IRNM4N]

So funny! I took it pretty easy as I knew I had a crap load of driving to do the next day.

Originally Posted by TI.3VOM

Thanks for the write up! I know it's a lot of work cuz I'm working on mine! Working on reducing the size of all the pics... The Welt was closed when I took delivery (Monday) so thanks for the pics! I was going to go back the next day but I celebrated a little to hard that night and was in no condition to go anywhere the next morning...

[RowanBuds]

Congrats, and thanks for sharing what looks to have been an awesome trip with all of us! Now you're starting the real wait, from what I've heard. Good luck with the anxiety!

[Bluex]

Originally Posted by IRNM4N

We got the Capital One Venture One car specifically for this trip as they give a large limit and have no foreign transaction fees. We brought about $500 euro in cash and that was about right.

Got it, thanks. Our Wells Fargo bank card is actually a Chip and Pin card, so it should be fine over there (as well as other credit cards), but $500 EU sounds good as well.

[AIRPOWER]

IRNM4N, Congrats on your new acquisition. The pictures were awesome, especially in front of Neuschwanstein.

Love the I///M Ready T-shirt, where did you get it?

[IRNM4N]

Pretty sure amazon, etc. Was an xmas gift from the wife. All the Puma Stuff is excellent quality.

Originally Posted by AIRPOWER

IRNM4N, Congrats on your new acquisition. The pictures were awesome, especially in front of Neuschwanstein.

Love the I///M Ready T-shirt, where did you get it?

[Money2536]

Epic man! Congrats! We'll have to get the M Cars together soon. You need to bring that thing up to dial the paint in when it gets here.

[SakhirM4]

How can anyone look at this picture and think the M4 rear is blah compared to the M3

[FeckinSpaceman]

Love it man, congrats again and thanks for sharing pics along the way.

Epic trip....now enjoy the torture of waiting for it to get here!

Oh and thanks for the sexy golf pic cameo of me..... I need to work my glutes