The route: the epic Scottish highlands
The car: £120,000 Lamborghini Gallardo
Test-driven by: Jason Barlow, editor-at-large of BBC Top Gear magazine
David Tobin is a new kind of travel agent. "It's no longer just about having a holiday," he says. "It's about having an experience. The sort of experience money can't normally buy." I'm having one right now. A swift two-hour drive west of Inverness in northern Scotland and it seems I've arrived in an area next door to the middle of nowhere. A thorough 360-degree sweep reveals no trace of mankind. Those querulous little signal bars on my mobile phone have given up the ghost.
Up here, the scenery is locked in a Tolkienesque battle to upstage itself, for round every corner is a thrusting, jutting mountain more breathtaking than the last. According to the map, this is Sgurr A'Chaorachain, but it may as well be Mordor. There are two handsome stags on the moor beside me, and a pair of hawks hovering above. Moody Scottish weather is resolving itself into a glorious sunset. It's an unforgettable moment.
One of many, as it happens. Tobin runs a company called Dream Escape, and planning a route through this epic corner of the Scottish Highlands is only part of his clients' 'experience'. Food, drink, hunting, shooting, fishing, kayaking, whisky tasting (though not while kayaking or driving)... whatever Scotland offers, however mad or expensive, can be incorporated into a bespoke customer package.
Then there's the car you use to knit it all together. PJ O'Rourke's famous observation that "You can take a rented car anywhere. True, you can't always get it back, but that's not your problem, is it?" takes an early bath on this occasion: the rental in question is a £120,000 Lamborghini Gallardo. Tobin has connections with exotic car-hire firm Rio Prestige in Edinburgh, whose stock list includes Aston Martin, Bentley and Ferrari. Personally I'd do northern Scotland on the back of a horse and cart, but the addition of a 520bhp internal combustion engine takes the journey into a whole new adrenalised realm.
So I fly into Inverness, and there in the airport car park, a man is decanting a yellow Italian supercar. The sun is shining, and before me lies mile after mile of deserted road, plunging headlong through vertiginous scenery. You don't need to be a car enthusiast to get off on that, do you? It helps, though. Lamborghini, founded in 1963 by disgruntled agriculturalist Ferruccio Lamborghini following shoddy service from Ferrari, specialises in the sort of performance machinery that takes real driver arrogance to pull off. Fortunately, there are only sheep and deer up here, neither of which are particularly judgemental. Audi took control of Lamborghini back in 1998, so a degree of high-quality Germanic zeal has been brought to bear on a firm whose products were previously as unpredictable as Oliver Reed and Peter O'Toole on a three-day bender. The doors shut with a thump and the interior is crafted from rich leather and solid plastics.
This is the small Lamborghini - by Lamborghini standards at any rate - so it fits these winding, devilish roads perfectly. I head along the A832 towards Kinlochewe, then onto the A896 over Glen Torridon and past the Shieldaig Forest. I've covered 25 miles - rather quickly, I must admit - before I see another car. The mountain pass to Applecross is one of those little map squiggles you could easily miss, but take my advice, don't: it's one of the best roads in the world, carved out of precipitous scenery. Even a yellow Lamborghini becomes an insignificant dot in here. I have lunch - delicious local rollmop herrings and cheese - in the Applecross Inn. "We don't keep our cars clean round here," the owner tells me, "because the rams have a habit of head-butting their reflections..." The day's drive finishes up in Poolewe 40 miles or so north, the road even more challenging at night. I'm booked into The Pool House Hotel, a great find tucked unpretentiously away on the edge of Loch Ewe. Bought in 1991 by Peter Harrison and transformed, each room has a different theme: mine is full of Titanic memorabilia (Peter's wife is related to the doomed ship's captain), though the log fire was the first thing I noticed. It's a supremely comfortable place, and a haven for whisky fanciers too. Peter selects four for me to sample, some peaty and earthy, others fruitier and more fragrant. All good, as the absence of a hangover the next morning demonstrates.
I head south again, marvelling at the scenery and clement conditions. Apparently the Gulf Stream whips close to this part of the west coast, dispelling the myth that the weather is always shabby up here. By lunchtime, I have Harry Potter - a Harris hawk - eating out of my hand. The M25 is another planet compared with this...
British Airways flies to Inverness from London Gatwick. Visit ba.com. Dream Escape offers a Scottish Driving Experience from £3,802. Price includes a night in a Grand Master suite at Pool House Hotel, dinner, whisky tasting, hawking and access to a performance car from Rio Prestige. Dream Escape, +44 (0)1368 850788; dreamescape.co.uk. Rio prestige, +44 (0)1506 466 911; rioprestige.com. For hawking, visit westhighlandhawking.com. For the Pool House Hotel, visit www.poolhousehotel.com
Read more about road trips at Revs and Rivieras, Take the high road and Let's hit the road.
