Star Road

Ideally, you want your rally to have three things: fun roads, great people, and pleasant weather. But there is something extra that a great rally has which is hard to define; the so-called “X factor”. From the first DWA rally in 2017, that was the strongest attribute of DWA rallies. But something changed in 2020. On March 15 of that year, we convened in Sausalito under the shadow of the Golden Gate Bridge and embarked on an epic rally. Unfortunately, you may recognize that date as an important turning point for a different reason: that’s the weekend the world shut down due to the Covid pandemic. Coincidentally or not, the DWA rallies were never the same since; we still drove our beloved cars together on gorgeous California roads, but the summer camp vibes weren’t the same. Back at work on Monday, we didn’t feel the rally withdrawals. But that all changed in October 2025 when the Sierra Rally 5 kicked off.

On Thursday, October 2nd, I was picked up by my friend Jon in San Jose, and we began our journey east toward one of the most epic mountain ranges in the world: the Sierra Nevada. Containing the largest tree in the world, the tallest point in the contiguous USA, and the largest alpine lake in the entire USA, it has a few impressive stats to go along with its stunning beauty.

Here we are going over Altamont Pass, which is considered a “low” mountain pass at only 1009 feet, but is still pretty epic.

As we got closer to the Sierras, Jon had an idea for a fun backroad detour. More curves? I’m always down!

In these days of smart phones it’s pretty hard to get truly lost. But by modern standards? We got lost. As you can see, this is where the pavement ends.

But the road doesn’t! There were quite a few rocks on this road, giving it a feeling of driving on marbles, but overall it was pretty well graded, with no washboard sections.

We popped out of the amber waves of grain into a surprisingly picturesque setting. Jon ripped a handbrake turn and suggested we take some photos here.

Great idea! What a neat little space to shoot. And of course, it helps to have such a photogenic car. The Mk1 Volkswagen Golf, or “Rabbit” as it was known in the USA (note the two reminders on the back of this car in case you forget), was designed by the legendary Giorgetto Giugiaro. Perfectly proportioned, clean and simple with elegant details: one of the best-looking hatchbacks ever created in my opinion.

As you would expect from Northern California in October, it was raining a bit. As soon as they arrived at the hotel, the Cobra team scrambled to put the cockpit tonneau cover on. They drove the entire rally in this Superformance replica with absolutely no top at all! Apparently the aerodynamics are actually decent; as long as you’re moving, the rain goes over the car. The co-driver told me this was much better than his old MG A, where the water would simply go over the windscreen and back into the cockpit.

Here’s a comparison between the current and previous generations of Porsche 911: 991.1 and 992.1. The Sport Classic on the right is the only one made in Linden Green, which is a very interesting color. They call it a “green” but it certainly looks yellow to me. We had wildly varying weather conditions throughout the rally, which made me even more appreciative of the nuances of this color.

Unfortunately, for the first part of the morning it was absolutely pouring rain, and in my infinite wisdom I had decided not to bring along my fantastically warm and weatherproof Columbia jacket. The good news is that rain stopped as soon as the drivers’ meeting ended and the rally began, so I was able to get a few snaps of cars rolling out.

This was a “regular” DWA rally, meaning that it’s open to any vehicle with Sense of Occasion (as opposed to their “Classic” rallies which are only open to cars from 1999 and earlier). When that happens, the heavy hitters come out. I particularly enjoyed seeing this 997 GT3, which is one of my favorite cars of all time.

However, Radwood-era cars are of course welcome and encouraged. Outside of car shows I never see DeLoreans, so it was a treat to see one out in the wild.

The Cobra wasn’t the only car without a top: this Caterham also did the whole weekend with no roof at all. At this point, I feel like you’re basically riding a two-person motorcycle with seatbelts. Too gnarly for me!

Within minutes of leaving the town square we were out on the backroads. The first road was rough and littered with potholes. Warren, the rally route master, seen here driving in front of us in his Dakar Yellow E36 M3, was pretty stoked about the happy coincidence of the very first road being the most gnarly: if you can handle this, the rest of the rally is smooth sailing.

Even though the theoretical ideal road is freshly paved and as smooth as a billiard table, I love these rough rural roads. Their very nature encourages awareness and proper car setup, and speed is tamped down by the gauntlet of bumps and holes. This is what “rally” is all about to me.

It’s nice living in a city where infrastructure is built up and everything is within arm’s reach, but for me nothing beats the beauty and peace of driving through rural areas.

Not all of the rally roads are tiny rural routes; here we are at the intersection of two major highways. But of course, even rural highways are tiny compared to what us suburbanites are used to: when two major highways intersect in our cities, the onramps tend to have more lanes than this highway does.

I took a ton of photos from the passenger seat on this rally, but sometimes I just had to sit back and enjoy the show. Right after this photo was taken we entered a spectacular hillclimb clinging to the edge of a mountain. As time goes on I’ve really started to appreciate “corner complexes” (to use a race track term); short sections of linked corners that really get the blood pumping. As the 20 MPH sign hints at, just ahead is a section of curves that rivals any road in the world. Just don’t tell anybody!

What makes a rally so much different than a regular road trip is the rhythm. Sure, you could devour the entire route before lunchtime in one go, but that’s like eating a five course meal without coming up for air. When you drive for a bit and then pause to hang out, you end up appreciating both of those scenarios even more.

I also ended up appreciating the Rabbit even more. My BRZ is an angry ricer car that regular people don’t really know about and car enthusiasts don’t really care about, but the reception of the Rabbit is completely different. Random traffic coming the other way would wave or give us thumbs ups; some random dude came up to us in the Autozone parking lot to praise the car. And when we stopped, curious rally-goers gathered to poke around and check out all the interesting mods.

Thankfully for the no-roof drivers, the rain had stopped by this point.

It’s a treat when we come across big turnouts like these; they allow lots of us to stop and hang out, which really creates the vibe of a rolling “cars and coffee” type meet.

Due to mildly amusing planning shenanigans, I was not able to co-drive my usual rally ride, the legendary Vololvo. But of course, I was still very happy to see Drew out there driving it.

I just love the mountainous forest terrain in this part of the world. And there’s just something special about roads with no guardrails.

I didn’t bother to ask if this masking tape was just for looks or to serve an actual function. Usually when people tape cars for protection, the front bumper is the main thing you want to cover.

Load up on adrenaline, park and chill, then repeat: that’s a good rally recipe.

I see a lot of FK8 and FL5 Civic Type R’s, but the Integra Type S remains elusive. It was a lovely treat to see this nicely modded example out there on the good roads.

Looks like it’s just about time to get back on the road.

Old roads like this are funky in the best possible way; instead of straight, clean approaches into turns, you’ll often find areas like this with kinks and bumps in braking zones. Technical roads like this are part of what makes driving in California so satisfying.

Is that sunlight peeking out in the background? Finally! We stopped here to turn around (a DWA rally rarity, but not a negative point at all in this case) and graciously, Jon suggested that I drive back down in the Rabbit. Well I wasn’t going to say no to that! I love driving downhill and we had a great run to our next stop.

When you’re up in the Sierras, even the so-called “transit stages” linking the fun sections together are beautiful.

In the car, I bounced back and forth between using my 40mm prime (shown here) and 70-200mm zoom lens. In the case of the wider lens, I tried to show off some elements of the car, particularly the vent windows and the wind splits on the front fender.

Despite the blue skies, it was raining in our location, so there are some shots through a wet windshield.

It looks pretty threatening in that direction.

I saw this spot as we came around a corner and called for a photo stop. We hit the dirt a bit too fast and just understeered straight on! Luckily we were going pretty slowly, so it was much more of a comical moment than feeling like we were about to tumble down the mountain.

Further up, we saw rain and wet roads again. Despite the shiny surface, these roads were surprisingly grippy and confidence inspiring.

Driving an E9 in the rain?? Ballsy! These lovely cars had a poor design under the skin that traps moisture inside of its ungalvanized steel body. I still don’t understand how cars had been common for 50 years and steel had been common for 100 years, yet rust-proofing design and technology were still foreign concepts to automakers in the 1960’s. The cynical side of me thinks this may have been done intentionally so people would be forced to buy a new car in just a few years when their old one converted itself to iron oxide.

A couple of big 2+2 V8-powered sporty coupes. Which one would you rather take on a rally?

The C7 Corvette Grand Sport was released with a “Heritage Package”, a $795 option group that got you special floormats and these exterior stickers. There were a ton of different color combinations available, but only two of them had the very American combo of Red, White, and Blue. Max looked all over the country specifically for this exact color combo with a manual transmission, and then gave her the very appropriately patriotic nickname of Betsy Ross.

I drove out from Las Vegas and Nick drove from Carson City for this rally. In the past, John has driven out from Texas to join us. But I’m pretty sure that Nate, driving this NC Miata all the way from Cincinnati, Ohio, set the DWA Rally record for longest drive to and from the rally. Awesome!

Shhh…don’t tell anyone we’re not supposed to be here! Actually, some rangers rolled through (as they usually do) and were chill about it. Thankfully, we’re well-behaved and no one has blown up this spot yet, so we’re always able to chill for a bit.

It’s a very cool spot indeed; I love taking photos here against the backdrop of the rich blue lake and vibrant green trees.

Is this really a “green”? It looks almost highlighter yellow in the sun.

This Viper GTS is one of my personal favorites on the rally. I’ve loved them since their introduction in 1996. Similar to the DeLorean earlier in this post, it’s incredibly rare to see a Viper outside of a car show these days, so it’s a real treat to see it out here.

One piece of photographic kit that I find essential is the circular polarizer. It filters out polarized light, which makes glare and reflections on shiny surfaces like glass and paint disappear. As cars are mainly composed of shiny materials, and I mainly shoot cars, you can understand why every lens I own is permanently equipped with a polarizer. The circular part refers to how you can turn it to change which light is filtered; normally I rotate it like this, with the top of the car’s reflections and glare removed.

However, sometimes it filters out light that you want to see. If I rotate the filter in my usual direction as in the previous photo, that blocks out the lovely rainbow in the background. In this photo, turning the polarizer to be able to see the rainbow removes the reflections on the side of the car, which some people actually prefer. The glare on the hood and windshield bothers me a bit, so I rarely turn the polarizer like this.

Here it is with just the lake and rainbow. You definitely want to see that lovely rainbow, however…

…check out how much deeper and richer the lake itself appears in this one, when the reflections and glare off the water are filtered out.

Smiles for now while the sun is shining!

One of the best things about the DWA community is the vibrant diversity of cars; everybody has a different idea of what makes a fun car. While some are in classic sports cars with no roof, others might want to live out their Ronin fantasy in a first-generation Audi S8.

DWA is a group of drivers. Some reviews have hailed the 911 S/T as the greatest driver’s Porsche yet; unfortunately, due to the high price tag ($290,000 base MSRP) and much higher secondhand values (at the time of writing, BaT has listed 12 and the lowest final bid was $635,000), this seems to be a vehicle where the majority of the 1,963 units sold are destined to forever sit in air-conditioned storage due to their investment potential. However, Doug specifically ordered this particular car in “White” with as few fripperies as possible, because this is a car to drive. Is the rarest and coolest S/T a simple non-PTS car with miles on the clock? I’d say so.

After the dam, we headed back out into the forest.

It had lightly rained at the dam (hence the rainbow), but back on the road it was nice and sunny. Convertible tops went down!

But just a few minutes later, we were back in the wet stuff.

I loved these conditions. It was relatively bright for a rainy day, and there were some really cool reflections off the wet tarmac.

There was a bit of a shuffle when we left the dam. We’d intended to take a certain forest route to our next stop, but while en route the radio suddenly lit up with everyone calling in the same thing: the road was closed! Instead of venturing all the way to the road block, we decided to not even bother with that; our late position leaving the dam suddenly put us near the front of the pack. There’s a particular type of panning shot I particularly enjoy but rarely end up taking on a rally; now that we were in front of everyone it was a great time to pounce. When the perfect spot appeared we had to stop.

This is the perfect angle for simple, easily repeatable, great looking action shots: right at the beginning of a curve after a straight. Just set the lens to wide open and let the fast shutter and bokeh do the work: this is an easy way to get consistent beautiful shots.

I took pictures of every car that drove by, so if you were on the rally and want to see your car, or if you just like this angle as much as I do, I suggest you check out all the pics in my Flickr album.

Most of the cars were pretty clumped together as a result of the road closure, but there some gaps in the traffic. In such a peaceful area we could hear the cars coming from a long way away, so I took a few snaps of the Rabbit as we were waiting.

Once we were relatively confident that all the cars had passed, we got back on the road.

People love the phrase “slow car fast”, but with the two-liter swap I don’t think you can call the Rabbit “slow” anymore, nor can that be said about Jon’s pace behind the wheel. But compared to many of the beastly modern cars on the rally and some of the balls-out driving styles, you can’t really say they’re “fast”, either. Hence a new phrase that Jon coined: Medium Car Medium. It proved to be quite fun driving a swift car at a swift pace, and as a result we caught back up with the pack fairly quickly.

There were a few different Golf generations (Mk1, 4, 6, 7, and 8) as well as several other hot hatches on this rally. As always, we had grand plans of getting all the Golfs or all the hatches together for a group photo but sadly, it never happened.

On the way back, we stopped at a vista point called “The Rim of the World”, which is comically not the only place in the world that lays claim to such a title.

From a photographic perspective, places like this give me immense respect for landscape photographers throughout time, from Ansel Adams to today. With a vista that stretches dozens of miles into the distance and a thousand feet down, the view is stunning.

Sadly, wherever I pointed my camera just seems flat. I suppose that I’ve spent so much time working on the concept of “figure and ground” that I struggle with landscapes.

Are you really driving an old car if you’re not adding oil regularly?

Another great attribute shared by many DWAers is the DIY spirit. It can be a little scary to head out into the wild with no cell phone coverage in an old car, but I can relax in the presence of people who build and work on their own cars.

Some of these photos were deceptively hard to edit, but this is exactly why I like using a great camera (Nikon Z6 II) and great software (Lightroom). Your brain has no problem processing the light from a scene like this, and phone cameras automatically post-process such scenes, but this really pushes the limits of “dumb” cameras like my Nikon. You have to make sure you don’t over-expose the bright section in the background because once you “blow out” the highlights (bright areas) you can’t get them back; then during the editing phase you have to carefully balance the scene, which takes all the dynamic range the camera’s sensor can provide as you mask off different parts of the image to edit them differently.

For me, the ultimate idea is that you don’t notice any of that. This photo required even more editing as I had to also individually mask most of the people. But hopefully, it just looks natural to the viewer.

Can someone from the state of Washington explain to me what is going on with the characters on this license plate? You are only allowed seven characters on a license plate in WA, so why are they so narrow? I dig the font but it just seems impractical from the standpoint of what license plates are actually for: identifying the registration of a vehicle. That actually goes for most states in the USA; Nevada plates, for example, are generally very hard to read. This is in sharp contrast to European plates, which are quite a bit larger and feature very bold and clear characters.

For many, the parking lot party at the end of a day is a great opportunity to relax with friends while having a drink or a smoke. For others, it’s time to wrench.

Art was out in his K24-swapped E30 again and still having teething problems with the swap. At this point, there were problems with the MAP (Manifold Absolute Pressure) sensor.

One minor problem is the car’s exhaust still sounds abysmal. I feel like the problem stems from right here: that header. With an infinite budget, I would send my car to Brilliant in Japan and have them figure something out.

On a positive note, his new interior is awesome. Not only do they look fantastic, but it feels great to sit on brand new seats instead of foam that’s had 40 years of ass pressure wearing them down.

This is another car I’ve loved since they first came out, and now it’s on the verge of becoming a classic. As you would expect from Ruben, it’s done up just right for the type of fast road driving we enjoy.

I love the understated aggression of the 911 S/T. On one hand it’s subtle with a small front lip and no rear wing, but it also has the aggressive nose vents and cut out fenders.

I haven’t driven this car, but it seems like the ultimate modern Porsche for spirited road driving.

The Integra Type S and its sister, the Civic Type R, have been related to a front-wheel-drive 911 GT3. That makes this already funny vanity plate even funnier to me.

It’s remarkable how similar car sizes were for decades. Somehow in the past ten or twenty years, everyone has decided that size is unacceptably tiny. Odd.

None of the four guys in this Alfa Romeo are under six feet tall. And yet, they were all comfy in this tiny old car that modern folks would judge as barely large enough to carry themselves and an iced coffee.

These are the rally withdrawals. Even at dinner, you’re going over the photos and videos of the day.

It was good times and laughs at our group dinner, even though this tiny space was oppressively loud.

Under this funky lighting, Linden Green does actually seem a bit green. Being next to a Dakar Yellow car helps too.

On Saturday morning we took off late because we wanted to drive with Art (who is seemingly always late) and of course, he immediately broke down. Again.

Ryan from Beeline helped a lot of people work on their cars on this rally, especially Art and the E30.

With the E30 headed back into town, Jon and I took off solo in the Rabbit onto what I believe is one of the greatest roads in the world.

There’s no center line and no guardrails on this epic mountain pass. The pavement is virtually perfect and there is a great variety of different turns with varying radii and elevation. And it’s next door to Yosemite, so it’s just almost one of the most beautiful places in the world.

Past the peak and you’re into a great downhill section. There are tons of blind crests as the road follows the natural contours of the mountain instead of smoothing it out.

Another one of my favorite characteristics of a road is when the apex of a turn is at a tree.

It can be hard to get a perspective of the immense scale of this mountain range. Those tiny shrubs on the hillside behind? Full-grown trees on a massive mountain face!

Then the road smooths out and gets wider, gaining a double yellow line again. I love the juxtaposition of evergreens against the yellows and reds of trees changing color.

Trees are so awesome. Not only do they recycle our carbon dioxide and turn it into lovely oxygen, they just look damn cool too.

We’d had a great run up the mountain, so when we saw this group pulled over for repairs, we stopped to lend a hand.

The Volvo V50 blew a coolant line and they were attempting the classic roadside fix with duct tape and zip ties.

While waiting, the last few stragglers who I had missed earlier came up the mountain.

Ryan saw me taking pics so he turned around and zoomed back down for another set of snaps!

And then he parked up to see if any mechanical help was needed.

I see way more Miatas driving around than 86’s, which shows how much sports car drivers value a focused experience; the 86 loses a bit of purity and gains a bit of weight in its pursuit of being a bit more usable: all things that are detrimental to fun driving.

Believe it or not, just a week after this was heavy snowfall in this area. The timing was perfect for these lovely fall colors and perfectly comfortable weather.

Oh! More cars! After going so long without seeing anyone I assumed we were the backmarkers, but it turns out there were a few more stragglers.

Finally back on the road, we saw more epic landscapes. This surreal yellow grove looked straight out of a videogame designer’s imagination.

Another wow moment, looking out over this epic valley to the mountain beyond, with peaks already covered in snow in early October.

Ultra fast downhill sweepers led us lower and lower, popping ears as we went down.

Another scene that messes with your sense of scale; those trees in the background are actually huge, and that next turn is a long way away.

With so many twists and turns, sometimes the polarizer doesn’t get turned the right way; I almost edited this one in black and white as a result. It’s so fun to fly over crests on a road like this.

This is the sort of turn that causes people to crash in videogames; your digital courage tells you to keep it pinned over the crest because that 15 mph hairpin sign doesn’t really apply to you, does it?

We didn’t see any snow on the ground and the outside temperatures all weekend were actually quite reasonable, but there was a lot of snow just above us.

And then, we saw this: not just a sexy corner complex, but a nice little turnout!

Perfect spot for our three car group to stop.

And of course, I had to get some pics of people coming down.

This spot featured literal panoramic videos; there were so many different spots for cool photos.

The car in the frame helps give some perspective on the size of this landscape.

I tried looking around with my 70-200, and the telephoto lens made the landscape look even smaller.

It looks like there are shrubs poking out of a rock; they were actually large trees growing out of a mountain.

After a bit of driving, we saw this group and decided to stop again.

Oh bother. The K24 had been plumbed to the OEM BMW oil cooler, and one of the fittings ripped off and promptly dumped all of the engine oil over the highway–as well as the right front tire and brake of the E30. Luckily, we didn’t notice any nasty fluids on the ground, and Art was able to safely bring the car to a stop in a good place. That could have turned out extremely bad on a road like this.

The nice thing about being in a sweet ride like the Rabbit is that you just have to turn around to see a gorgeous car; wherever you go, there it is. Very reassuring.

I love going for the slow shutter panning shots, despite the risk of not getting anything good at all.

A few cars donated their extra oil supplies, and got back on the road.

Completely unrelated to the rally, we saw these guys cruising in a Jeep CJ-5. It even has the old black license plates!

After this I jumped in with Art to finally get a ride in the E30. We spent the first few miles cleaning the oil off the brakes and tires, but even worse, there were exactly zero good turns from here back into town. Despite this, as I have mentioned before, even the transit stages out here are beautiful, and it’s hard not to have fun in such a place, riding in a sweet car with a good friend.

The Viper is a liftback! Of course, it’s hilariously compromised in the name of styling. Good luck lifting heavy items over the rear spoiler.

Good morning! One of the benefits of a “hub and spoke” rally like this, where we stay at the same hotel each night, is that we don’t have to drag around all our stuff in the twisties every day. However, since Sunday was only a half day of driving before we headed back home, all of our gear would accompany us in the car all day.

The roads on Sunday were calm as we meandered past local farms. These cows probably think we are on the wrong side of the fence.

Despite the remote location, the main roads out there are wide and nicely paved.

We were itching to find a good photo spot, and finally stumbled upon a big enough roadside area to explore.

It’s really beating a dead horse to say that the people make the rally, but it’s true. This is where the magical X factor stems from: when you remove yourself from the daily grind and focus entirely on the hobby you love, magic happens.

Compared to the Sierras, the scenery down here could be considered not very impressive. Still, I have a sentimental love for this environment as it reminds me of home.

After a rally on mostly super smooth roads, there was one more gnarly one to close it out.

Whoa, this was a funky hill. It’s very rare to find round “soft” hills like this in California.

The double yellows appeared, and the road got smoother.

Ahh yes, one last beautiful section of no center line road, hewn from the face of a mountain.

Then we caught up with traffic as we rolled downhill into our final meetup of the rally.

One of the rallygoers had a friend in town, who showed up in his rad old Dodge van.

After a round of high fives and goodbyes, we were back on the road to the bay area, trudging through the desolate central valley. The barren flatness was amazing; it was a relatively clear day and you could see all the way to the mirage at the horizon.

And as soon as I was dropped off at home again, the rally withdrawls began; I wished I was back out on the rally. I drove back home on Monday, thinking of the rally the whole way. On Tuesday, it was hard to be back at work while thinking of the rally. We had by far the most Discord participation on this rally, and it was great to see people sharing pics from the weekend and stories about making it home. DWA rallies are back, baby!