SQ5 European Delivery
12-06-2013, 02:46 PM
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SQ5 European Delivery
Sorry this is long overdue, but I wanted to wait till we got our car back to report our entire process and journey.
After years of planning, European Delivery finally became a reality. For our entire trip, we traveled through 8 countries (Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, France, Belgium, Netherlands, and Iceland) in 18 days on our trip. With the car, we had it for a little over 1 week. We went through 7 countries and over 1200 miles driving across Europe.
My wife and I were trying to fit ED with our European Honeymoon last year. However due to delays in production on the slightly redesigned 2013 Q5, the timing of it all just didn't work out. In the end, it was a blessing in disguise. We were able to focus on our Honeymoon last year and turns out we were able to plan another trip where we would get the 2014 SQ5 in the Estoril Blue my wife wanted instead.
I've never posted pics previously on this forum, so I hope they come out alright as attachments. I'll try to give more details on our entire Audi ED experience in addition to some small details on our overall vacation. We traveled in a group of 6 people (my parents, my wife's parents, my wife, and myself). It was an adventurous idea to include the parents, but we survived.
First we flew out from California on 10/2 and arrived in Munich on 10/3. We had originally requested a delivery date of 10/4. However due to an issue with the German Holiday falling on Thursday 10/3, this made Friday 10/4 become an "unofficial" holiday with the factory being closed. While I could have received delivery on 10/4, we wanted to experience the entire process including the factory tour. I moved some things around and we had a delivery date of Monday 10/7. That gave us a few days to stay busy in and around Munich.
10/2: Flew out from Sacramento
10/3: Arrived in Munich and took the train from the airport to the City Center where our hotel was located
10/4: We visited BMW Welt, which was FREE. I actually enjoyed this more than the Audi Museum. After lunch we headed over to OKTOBERFEST!!! I planned it, so that we would be in Munich during Oktoberfest.
10/5: Day trip tour to Salzburg
10/6: Day trip tour to Rothenburg and Harburg; after the tour, we grabbed all our bags and took the train back to the airport to stay the night at the Kempinski hotel. It's a nice hotel, but probably more of a business type hotel.
10/7: After a somewhat sleepless night, it was DELIVERY DAY!!! Audi picked us up and all of our luggage at 8:30am. It was supposed to be a 45 minute drive, however due to traffic we didn't arrive till around 9:45am. This was the only bad part. By being late, we didn't get to see our car roll into the Forum, it was already parked waiting for us. After running through all of the logistics, it was time for us to see our car up close. After a bunch of pics and a tour of our car, my wife was the first to drive the car from the garage to the forum parking lot. Due to our delays in the morning, we were running very tight on time. The factory tour started at 11:30am, while our delivery process completed at around 11:15am. Originally I was hoping to eat lunch before going on the tour, but we were only able to grab a quick drink. The factory tour lasted around 2 hours. They showed us basically all the steps along the way of building a new Audi. During our tour, they were building A3's. It was an interesting experience to see the entire process. No pictures were allowed inside of the factory. After the factory tour, we grabbed lunch at the forum. It's a pretty nice variety of options, but the food was just OK. But it's free, so I wasn't complaining. After lunch, we walked through the Audi Museum. After seeing BMW Welt, this museum was a little disappointing. That concluded our day at the Audi Forum. My wife and I went to Europcar to pick up our additional rental car (Mercedes C180). It was a Mercedes, but that car wasn't very exciting.
With our SQ5 and rental car, we were headed off to Nauders (Austria), which was a 3.5 to 4 hour drive. Originally I was planning to stop by the Neuschwanstein Castle for pictures, but it was getting late and that would have added an additional 30-60 minutes to our drive. One of the things I looked forward to was driving the Autobahn with NO SPEED LIMITS. I was told to keep the car under 4000RPM within the first 1000km. Since my car was brand new plus my dad was following me in the rental car, I didn't get to drive as fast as my heart desired, but I still cranked it up to about 110-120mph. Let's just say the car accelerated effortlessly. It did not take much effort for the car to hit those speeds. After some adventures with closed roads, eventually we arrived at our hotel in Nauders. FYI, you need to purchase an Austria vignette, which was under 10 EUR.
10/8: After a good night's rest, it was time to get back on the road. We were looking at 6+ hours of driving on this day. We were going from Austria passing through Italy on our way to Switzerland. On our way crossing the Italian border, we were pulled over for a random inspection. While the inspection was pain free, it delayed us about 30-60 minutes. After deciding on ED, there was one road I had to experience. For anyone who watches Top Gear, Stelvio Pass became infamous for all of its hairpin turns. While this road is a MUST for the breathtaking views, the drive was not as exciting as I had hoped. We were there on a weekday, so there weren't many cars or bicycles, however this still isn't a road where you can enjoy fast wipping turns. I definitely had no regrets of driving it, but maybe my expectations were simply too high. Hahah. We continued on through the Swiss Alps on our way to Lucerne (Switzerland). FYI, you need to purchase a Switzerland vignette, which was around 30 EUR.
10/9: Let's just say, I had some very close calls maneuvering out of our hotel parking garage. My impact sensors were flatlining on me. Luckily I made it out without any issues. Next stop was Paris (France). This was going to be another long day of driving, around another 6 hours. Luckily this was going to be the last LONG drive of our trip. While we had been to Paris before and so had my in-laws, my parents had never been to Europe previously. For that reason, we felt Paris was a MUST SEE for them, plus my wife wanted to do some shopping. :O
10/10: We did a little more shopping during the day, plus some touristy stuff. We ended our day at the top of the Eiffel Tower.
10/11: On to our next stop, Brussels (Belgium). After passing the "break-in" mileage, this was the first time I switched the SQ5 Drive Select into Dynamic mode. The car definitely functions much differently in this mode. I can't wait to get this car back home to test the car without all of the added weight of our luggage in the car.
10/12: On our second day in Brussels, we explored the Atomium and Mini Europe as well as many other parts of the city.
10/13: We drove on to our final destination with our car, which was Amsterdam (Netherlands). We had a good time at the Heineken Experience.
10/14: We dropped off our SQ5 in the morning. Be sure to bring all of the documentation Audi Forum provides. Let's just say the wife removed some documentation I had originally left in the glove box, so we had to go back to our hotel. The whole process takes less than an hour. Afterwards we dropped off the rental car and headed back to downtown by train afterwards. We explored the city and visited the Red Light District at night.
10/15: We spent the morning in Amsterdam, but headed to the airport afterwards. We flew into Iceland. We had dinner in Reykjavic before heading to South Iceland.
10/16 - 10/19: We stayed in South Iceland for two nights to explore the Jokulsarlon Glaciers and Skaftafell National Park. We saw a number of different waterfalls (Skogafoss, Seljalandsfoss, and Gullfoss) and the Geysir geyser. We ended our vacation by relaxing at the Blue Lagoon on the last day before flying back home. Originally I never thought about visiting Iceland, but I just happened to stumble across IcelandAir which provides a free layover up to 1 week, plus their airfare is cheaper than most companies. If you like the outdoors, this place is a MUST SEE. Just by driving around in our rental car, we saw so many different things. We didn't even get a chance to try some of the more adventurous excursions. The only unfortunate thing about Iceland is that we were unable to see the Northern Lights. It just wasn't in the forecast.
The waiting game was no fun. While Audi said it may take 11-13 weeks before our car arrives, it took us less than 8 weeks for our car to go from Amsterdam to Northern California. We just picked up the car last night. I have yet to drive it yet since it came back to the US. It's technically my wife's car, so I let her be the first to drive it home. I can't wait to drive it after work tonight.
After years of planning, European Delivery finally became a reality. For our entire trip, we traveled through 8 countries (Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, France, Belgium, Netherlands, and Iceland) in 18 days on our trip. With the car, we had it for a little over 1 week. We went through 7 countries and over 1200 miles driving across Europe.
My wife and I were trying to fit ED with our European Honeymoon last year. However due to delays in production on the slightly redesigned 2013 Q5, the timing of it all just didn't work out. In the end, it was a blessing in disguise. We were able to focus on our Honeymoon last year and turns out we were able to plan another trip where we would get the 2014 SQ5 in the Estoril Blue my wife wanted instead.
I've never posted pics previously on this forum, so I hope they come out alright as attachments. I'll try to give more details on our entire Audi ED experience in addition to some small details on our overall vacation. We traveled in a group of 6 people (my parents, my wife's parents, my wife, and myself). It was an adventurous idea to include the parents, but we survived.
First we flew out from California on 10/2 and arrived in Munich on 10/3. We had originally requested a delivery date of 10/4. However due to an issue with the German Holiday falling on Thursday 10/3, this made Friday 10/4 become an "unofficial" holiday with the factory being closed. While I could have received delivery on 10/4, we wanted to experience the entire process including the factory tour. I moved some things around and we had a delivery date of Monday 10/7. That gave us a few days to stay busy in and around Munich.
10/2: Flew out from Sacramento
10/3: Arrived in Munich and took the train from the airport to the City Center where our hotel was located
10/4: We visited BMW Welt, which was FREE. I actually enjoyed this more than the Audi Museum. After lunch we headed over to OKTOBERFEST!!! I planned it, so that we would be in Munich during Oktoberfest.
10/5: Day trip tour to Salzburg
10/6: Day trip tour to Rothenburg and Harburg; after the tour, we grabbed all our bags and took the train back to the airport to stay the night at the Kempinski hotel. It's a nice hotel, but probably more of a business type hotel.
10/7: After a somewhat sleepless night, it was DELIVERY DAY!!! Audi picked us up and all of our luggage at 8:30am. It was supposed to be a 45 minute drive, however due to traffic we didn't arrive till around 9:45am. This was the only bad part. By being late, we didn't get to see our car roll into the Forum, it was already parked waiting for us. After running through all of the logistics, it was time for us to see our car up close. After a bunch of pics and a tour of our car, my wife was the first to drive the car from the garage to the forum parking lot. Due to our delays in the morning, we were running very tight on time. The factory tour started at 11:30am, while our delivery process completed at around 11:15am. Originally I was hoping to eat lunch before going on the tour, but we were only able to grab a quick drink. The factory tour lasted around 2 hours. They showed us basically all the steps along the way of building a new Audi. During our tour, they were building A3's. It was an interesting experience to see the entire process. No pictures were allowed inside of the factory. After the factory tour, we grabbed lunch at the forum. It's a pretty nice variety of options, but the food was just OK. But it's free, so I wasn't complaining. After lunch, we walked through the Audi Museum. After seeing BMW Welt, this museum was a little disappointing. That concluded our day at the Audi Forum. My wife and I went to Europcar to pick up our additional rental car (Mercedes C180). It was a Mercedes, but that car wasn't very exciting.
With our SQ5 and rental car, we were headed off to Nauders (Austria), which was a 3.5 to 4 hour drive. Originally I was planning to stop by the Neuschwanstein Castle for pictures, but it was getting late and that would have added an additional 30-60 minutes to our drive. One of the things I looked forward to was driving the Autobahn with NO SPEED LIMITS. I was told to keep the car under 4000RPM within the first 1000km. Since my car was brand new plus my dad was following me in the rental car, I didn't get to drive as fast as my heart desired, but I still cranked it up to about 110-120mph. Let's just say the car accelerated effortlessly. It did not take much effort for the car to hit those speeds. After some adventures with closed roads, eventually we arrived at our hotel in Nauders. FYI, you need to purchase an Austria vignette, which was under 10 EUR.
10/8: After a good night's rest, it was time to get back on the road. We were looking at 6+ hours of driving on this day. We were going from Austria passing through Italy on our way to Switzerland. On our way crossing the Italian border, we were pulled over for a random inspection. While the inspection was pain free, it delayed us about 30-60 minutes. After deciding on ED, there was one road I had to experience. For anyone who watches Top Gear, Stelvio Pass became infamous for all of its hairpin turns. While this road is a MUST for the breathtaking views, the drive was not as exciting as I had hoped. We were there on a weekday, so there weren't many cars or bicycles, however this still isn't a road where you can enjoy fast wipping turns. I definitely had no regrets of driving it, but maybe my expectations were simply too high. Hahah. We continued on through the Swiss Alps on our way to Lucerne (Switzerland). FYI, you need to purchase a Switzerland vignette, which was around 30 EUR.
10/9: Let's just say, I had some very close calls maneuvering out of our hotel parking garage. My impact sensors were flatlining on me. Luckily I made it out without any issues. Next stop was Paris (France). This was going to be another long day of driving, around another 6 hours. Luckily this was going to be the last LONG drive of our trip. While we had been to Paris before and so had my in-laws, my parents had never been to Europe previously. For that reason, we felt Paris was a MUST SEE for them, plus my wife wanted to do some shopping. :O
10/10: We did a little more shopping during the day, plus some touristy stuff. We ended our day at the top of the Eiffel Tower.
10/11: On to our next stop, Brussels (Belgium). After passing the "break-in" mileage, this was the first time I switched the SQ5 Drive Select into Dynamic mode. The car definitely functions much differently in this mode. I can't wait to get this car back home to test the car without all of the added weight of our luggage in the car.
10/12: On our second day in Brussels, we explored the Atomium and Mini Europe as well as many other parts of the city.
10/13: We drove on to our final destination with our car, which was Amsterdam (Netherlands). We had a good time at the Heineken Experience.
10/14: We dropped off our SQ5 in the morning. Be sure to bring all of the documentation Audi Forum provides. Let's just say the wife removed some documentation I had originally left in the glove box, so we had to go back to our hotel. The whole process takes less than an hour. Afterwards we dropped off the rental car and headed back to downtown by train afterwards. We explored the city and visited the Red Light District at night.
10/15: We spent the morning in Amsterdam, but headed to the airport afterwards. We flew into Iceland. We had dinner in Reykjavic before heading to South Iceland.
10/16 - 10/19: We stayed in South Iceland for two nights to explore the Jokulsarlon Glaciers and Skaftafell National Park. We saw a number of different waterfalls (Skogafoss, Seljalandsfoss, and Gullfoss) and the Geysir geyser. We ended our vacation by relaxing at the Blue Lagoon on the last day before flying back home. Originally I never thought about visiting Iceland, but I just happened to stumble across IcelandAir which provides a free layover up to 1 week, plus their airfare is cheaper than most companies. If you like the outdoors, this place is a MUST SEE. Just by driving around in our rental car, we saw so many different things. We didn't even get a chance to try some of the more adventurous excursions. The only unfortunate thing about Iceland is that we were unable to see the Northern Lights. It just wasn't in the forecast.
The waiting game was no fun. While Audi said it may take 11-13 weeks before our car arrives, it took us less than 8 weeks for our car to go from Amsterdam to Northern California. We just picked up the car last night. I have yet to drive it yet since it came back to the US. It's technically my wife's car, so I let her be the first to drive it home. I can't wait to drive it after work tonight.
12-06-2013, 03:12 PM
#2
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Here are a few more pics. Sorry I didn't take too many detailed car pics. While this trip was for our car, we turned it into a pretty amazing European vacation.
Here are my overall opinion on the entire experience. As mentioned this process, turned into a 2 year process with lots of planning and plenty of stress along the way. For me, I like to layout and plan my trips in advance. This was quite challenging while trying to do this and work with the entire ED process. At some point, we just had to say SCREW IT. We are not waiting for the final approvals from Audi and we started booking stuff in advance. There were some hiccups along the way with our Delivery Date, however we were able to work around it. But in the end, there were definitely NO REGRETS!!! Sure our trip probably would have been a little smoother and possibly more fun with only my wife, but in the end it turned out OK. Would I do ED again? If the possibility presented itself and I were looking for a new European car in the future, I would definitely consider doing it again. This trip was amazing.
It's possible we could have gotten a better price by either getting the ACNA membership discount or simply negotiating on a custom order for this SQ5, however when you decide to go with ED, it's definitely more about the experience.
If anyone has any ED questions, don't hesitate to ask. While I'm definitely not an EXPERT when it comes to ED, having gone through the entire process, I'm sure I have plenty of tips and suggestions that can be helpful. And also thanks to the other members of this forum for giving me advice and walking me through the process as well.
- This is from the all famous Hofbrau Beer Tent. Anyone up for 1 liter of beer?
- Here's an idea of what this road looks like from Google Maps
- This is about as good of a picture we could get from Stelvio Pass. It was pretty cloudy at the top of the mountain. The wife and I posed for a pic with the SQ5 along the way back down the mountain.
- This was a pretty trippy picture taken in the tunnels on our way to Switzerland. I think this was still in Italy.
- This was taken from the shores of Jokulsarlon Glacier Lagoon in Southern Iceland. The blue colors were amazing.
Here are my overall opinion on the entire experience. As mentioned this process, turned into a 2 year process with lots of planning and plenty of stress along the way. For me, I like to layout and plan my trips in advance. This was quite challenging while trying to do this and work with the entire ED process. At some point, we just had to say SCREW IT. We are not waiting for the final approvals from Audi and we started booking stuff in advance. There were some hiccups along the way with our Delivery Date, however we were able to work around it. But in the end, there were definitely NO REGRETS!!! Sure our trip probably would have been a little smoother and possibly more fun with only my wife, but in the end it turned out OK. Would I do ED again? If the possibility presented itself and I were looking for a new European car in the future, I would definitely consider doing it again. This trip was amazing.
It's possible we could have gotten a better price by either getting the ACNA membership discount or simply negotiating on a custom order for this SQ5, however when you decide to go with ED, it's definitely more about the experience.
If anyone has any ED questions, don't hesitate to ask. While I'm definitely not an EXPERT when it comes to ED, having gone through the entire process, I'm sure I have plenty of tips and suggestions that can be helpful. And also thanks to the other members of this forum for giving me advice and walking me through the process as well.
12-06-2013, 03:13 PM
#3
AudiWorld Super User
CONGRATULATION!!!!! 
Love the color!
To more memorize your trip, when your car get back to US - order customize license plates as your ED LP - IN 538 Z
One more idea
Love the color!
To more memorize your trip, when your car get back to US - order customize license plates as your ED LP - IN 538 Z
One more idea
Last edited by TIME89; 12-06-2013 at 03:26 PM.
12-10-2013, 12:16 PM
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Wow those are really nice. I'll probably frame them up like yours. While I wait for my California plates, I was told I can drive around with my temporary ED plates.
12-10-2013, 03:51 PM
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12-10-2013, 04:23 PM
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Sorry this is long overdue, but I wanted to wait till we got our car back to report our entire process and journey.
After years of planning, European Delivery finally became a reality. For our entire trip, we traveled through 8 countries (Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, France, Belgium, Netherlands, and Iceland) in 18 days on our trip. With the car, we had it for a little over 1 week. We went through 7 countries and over 1200 miles driving across Europe.
My wife and I were trying to fit ED with our European Honeymoon last year. However due to delays in production on the slightly redesigned 2013 Q5, the timing of it all just didn't work out. In the end, it was a blessing in disguise. We were able to focus on our Honeymoon last year and turns out we were able to plan another trip where we would get the 2014 SQ5 in the Estoril Blue my wife wanted instead.
I've never posted pics previously on this forum, so I hope they come out alright as attachments. I'll try to give more details on our entire Audi ED experience in addition to some small details on our overall vacation. We traveled in a group of 6 people (my parents, my wife's parents, my wife, and myself). It was an adventurous idea to include the parents, but we survived.
First we flew out from California on 10/2 and arrived in Munich on 10/3. We had originally requested a delivery date of 10/4. However due to an issue with the German Holiday falling on Thursday 10/3, this made Friday 10/4 become an "unofficial" holiday with the factory being closed. While I could have received delivery on 10/4, we wanted to experience the entire process including the factory tour. I moved some things around and we had a delivery date of Monday 10/7. That gave us a few days to stay busy in and around Munich.
10/2: Flew out from Sacramento
10/3: Arrived in Munich and took the train from the airport to the City Center where our hotel was located
10/4: We visited BMW Welt, which was FREE. I actually enjoyed this more than the Audi Museum. After lunch we headed over to OKTOBERFEST!!! I planned it, so that we would be in Munich during Oktoberfest.
10/5: Day trip tour to Salzburg
10/6: Day trip tour to Rothenburg and Harburg; after the tour, we grabbed all our bags and took the train back to the airport to stay the night at the Kempinski hotel. It's a nice hotel, but probably more of a business type hotel.
10/7: After a somewhat sleepless night, it was DELIVERY DAY!!! Audi picked us up and all of our luggage at 8:30am. It was supposed to be a 45 minute drive, however due to traffic we didn't arrive till around 9:45am. This was the only bad part. By being late, we didn't get to see our car roll into the Forum, it was already parked waiting for us. After running through all of the logistics, it was time for us to see our car up close. After a bunch of pics and a tour of our car, my wife was the first to drive the car from the garage to the forum parking lot. Due to our delays in the morning, we were running very tight on time. The factory tour started at 11:30am, while our delivery process completed at around 11:15am. Originally I was hoping to eat lunch before going on the tour, but we were only able to grab a quick drink. The factory tour lasted around 2 hours. They showed us basically all the steps along the way of building a new Audi. During our tour, they were building A3's. It was an interesting experience to see the entire process. No pictures were allowed inside of the factory. After the factory tour, we grabbed lunch at the forum. It's a pretty nice variety of options, but the food was just OK. But it's free, so I wasn't complaining. After lunch, we walked through the Audi Museum. After seeing BMW Welt, this museum was a little disappointing. That concluded our day at the Audi Forum. My wife and I went to Europcar to pick up our additional rental car (Mercedes C180). It was a Mercedes, but that car wasn't very exciting.
With our SQ5 and rental car, we were headed off to Nauders (Austria), which was a 3.5 to 4 hour drive. Originally I was planning to stop by the Neuschwanstein Castle for pictures, but it was getting late and that would have added an additional 30-60 minutes to our drive. One of the things I looked forward to was driving the Autobahn with NO SPEED LIMITS. I was told to keep the car under 4000RPM within the first 1000km. Since my car was brand new plus my dad was following me in the rental car, I didn't get to drive as fast as my heart desired, but I still cranked it up to about 110-120mph. Let's just say the car accelerated effortlessly. It did not take much effort for the car to hit those speeds. After some adventures with closed roads, eventually we arrived at our hotel in Nauders. FYI, you need to purchase an Austria vignette, which was under 10 EUR.
10/8: After a good night's rest, it was time to get back on the road. We were looking at 6+ hours of driving on this day. We were going from Austria passing through Italy on our way to Switzerland. On our way crossing the Italian border, we were pulled over for a random inspection. While the inspection was pain free, it delayed us about 30-60 minutes. After deciding on ED, there was one road I had to experience. For anyone who watches Top Gear, Stelvio Pass became infamous for all of its hairpin turns. While this road is a MUST for the breathtaking views, the drive was not as exciting as I had hoped. We were there on a weekday, so there weren't many cars or bicycles, however this still isn't a road where you can enjoy fast wipping turns. I definitely had no regrets of driving it, but maybe my expectations were simply too high. Hahah. We continued on through the Swiss Alps on our way to Lucerne (Switzerland). FYI, you need to purchase a Switzerland vignette, which was around 30 EUR.
10/9: Let's just say, I had some very close calls maneuvering out of our hotel parking garage. My impact sensors were flatlining on me. Luckily I made it out without any issues. Next stop was Paris (France). This was going to be another long day of driving, around another 6 hours. Luckily this was going to be the last LONG drive of our trip. While we had been to Paris before and so had my in-laws, my parents had never been to Europe previously. For that reason, we felt Paris was a MUST SEE for them, plus my wife wanted to do some shopping. :O
10/10: We did a little more shopping during the day, plus some touristy stuff. We ended our day at the top of the Eiffel Tower.
10/11: On to our next stop, Brussels (Belgium). After passing the "break-in" mileage, this was the first time I switched the SQ5 Drive Select into Dynamic mode. The car definitely functions much differently in this mode. I can't wait to get this car back home to test the car without all of the added weight of our luggage in the car.
10/12: On our second day in Brussels, we explored the Atomium and Mini Europe as well as many other parts of the city.
10/13: We drove on to our final destination with our car, which was Amsterdam (Netherlands). We had a good time at the Heineken Experience.
10/14: We dropped off our SQ5 in the morning. Be sure to bring all of the documentation Audi Forum provides. Let's just say the wife removed some documentation I had originally left in the glove box, so we had to go back to our hotel. The whole process takes less than an hour. Afterwards we dropped off the rental car and headed back to downtown by train afterwards. We explored the city and visited the Red Light District at night.
10/15: We spent the morning in Amsterdam, but headed to the airport afterwards. We flew into Iceland. We had dinner in Reykjavic before heading to South Iceland.
10/16 - 10/19: We stayed in South Iceland for two nights to explore the Jokulsarlon Glaciers and Skaftafell National Park. We saw a number of different waterfalls (Skogafoss, Seljalandsfoss, and Gullfoss) and the Geysir geyser. We ended our vacation by relaxing at the Blue Lagoon on the last day before flying back home. Originally I never thought about visiting Iceland, but I just happened to stumble across IcelandAir which provides a free layover up to 1 week, plus their airfare is cheaper than most companies. If you like the outdoors, this place is a MUST SEE. Just by driving around in our rental car, we saw so many different things. We didn't even get a chance to try some of the more adventurous excursions. The only unfortunate thing about Iceland is that we were unable to see the Northern Lights. It just wasn't in the forecast.
The waiting game was no fun. While Audi said it may take 11-13 weeks before our car arrives, it took us less than 8 weeks for our car to go from Amsterdam to Northern California. We just picked up the car last night. I have yet to drive it yet since it came back to the US. It's technically my wife's car, so I let her be the first to drive it home. I can't wait to drive it after work tonight.
After years of planning, European Delivery finally became a reality. For our entire trip, we traveled through 8 countries (Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, France, Belgium, Netherlands, and Iceland) in 18 days on our trip. With the car, we had it for a little over 1 week. We went through 7 countries and over 1200 miles driving across Europe.
My wife and I were trying to fit ED with our European Honeymoon last year. However due to delays in production on the slightly redesigned 2013 Q5, the timing of it all just didn't work out. In the end, it was a blessing in disguise. We were able to focus on our Honeymoon last year and turns out we were able to plan another trip where we would get the 2014 SQ5 in the Estoril Blue my wife wanted instead.
I've never posted pics previously on this forum, so I hope they come out alright as attachments. I'll try to give more details on our entire Audi ED experience in addition to some small details on our overall vacation. We traveled in a group of 6 people (my parents, my wife's parents, my wife, and myself). It was an adventurous idea to include the parents, but we survived.
First we flew out from California on 10/2 and arrived in Munich on 10/3. We had originally requested a delivery date of 10/4. However due to an issue with the German Holiday falling on Thursday 10/3, this made Friday 10/4 become an "unofficial" holiday with the factory being closed. While I could have received delivery on 10/4, we wanted to experience the entire process including the factory tour. I moved some things around and we had a delivery date of Monday 10/7. That gave us a few days to stay busy in and around Munich.
10/2: Flew out from Sacramento
10/3: Arrived in Munich and took the train from the airport to the City Center where our hotel was located
10/4: We visited BMW Welt, which was FREE. I actually enjoyed this more than the Audi Museum. After lunch we headed over to OKTOBERFEST!!! I planned it, so that we would be in Munich during Oktoberfest.
10/5: Day trip tour to Salzburg
10/6: Day trip tour to Rothenburg and Harburg; after the tour, we grabbed all our bags and took the train back to the airport to stay the night at the Kempinski hotel. It's a nice hotel, but probably more of a business type hotel.
10/7: After a somewhat sleepless night, it was DELIVERY DAY!!! Audi picked us up and all of our luggage at 8:30am. It was supposed to be a 45 minute drive, however due to traffic we didn't arrive till around 9:45am. This was the only bad part. By being late, we didn't get to see our car roll into the Forum, it was already parked waiting for us. After running through all of the logistics, it was time for us to see our car up close. After a bunch of pics and a tour of our car, my wife was the first to drive the car from the garage to the forum parking lot. Due to our delays in the morning, we were running very tight on time. The factory tour started at 11:30am, while our delivery process completed at around 11:15am. Originally I was hoping to eat lunch before going on the tour, but we were only able to grab a quick drink. The factory tour lasted around 2 hours. They showed us basically all the steps along the way of building a new Audi. During our tour, they were building A3's. It was an interesting experience to see the entire process. No pictures were allowed inside of the factory. After the factory tour, we grabbed lunch at the forum. It's a pretty nice variety of options, but the food was just OK. But it's free, so I wasn't complaining. After lunch, we walked through the Audi Museum. After seeing BMW Welt, this museum was a little disappointing. That concluded our day at the Audi Forum. My wife and I went to Europcar to pick up our additional rental car (Mercedes C180). It was a Mercedes, but that car wasn't very exciting.
With our SQ5 and rental car, we were headed off to Nauders (Austria), which was a 3.5 to 4 hour drive. Originally I was planning to stop by the Neuschwanstein Castle for pictures, but it was getting late and that would have added an additional 30-60 minutes to our drive. One of the things I looked forward to was driving the Autobahn with NO SPEED LIMITS. I was told to keep the car under 4000RPM within the first 1000km. Since my car was brand new plus my dad was following me in the rental car, I didn't get to drive as fast as my heart desired, but I still cranked it up to about 110-120mph. Let's just say the car accelerated effortlessly. It did not take much effort for the car to hit those speeds. After some adventures with closed roads, eventually we arrived at our hotel in Nauders. FYI, you need to purchase an Austria vignette, which was under 10 EUR.
10/8: After a good night's rest, it was time to get back on the road. We were looking at 6+ hours of driving on this day. We were going from Austria passing through Italy on our way to Switzerland. On our way crossing the Italian border, we were pulled over for a random inspection. While the inspection was pain free, it delayed us about 30-60 minutes. After deciding on ED, there was one road I had to experience. For anyone who watches Top Gear, Stelvio Pass became infamous for all of its hairpin turns. While this road is a MUST for the breathtaking views, the drive was not as exciting as I had hoped. We were there on a weekday, so there weren't many cars or bicycles, however this still isn't a road where you can enjoy fast wipping turns. I definitely had no regrets of driving it, but maybe my expectations were simply too high. Hahah. We continued on through the Swiss Alps on our way to Lucerne (Switzerland). FYI, you need to purchase a Switzerland vignette, which was around 30 EUR.
10/9: Let's just say, I had some very close calls maneuvering out of our hotel parking garage. My impact sensors were flatlining on me. Luckily I made it out without any issues. Next stop was Paris (France). This was going to be another long day of driving, around another 6 hours. Luckily this was going to be the last LONG drive of our trip. While we had been to Paris before and so had my in-laws, my parents had never been to Europe previously. For that reason, we felt Paris was a MUST SEE for them, plus my wife wanted to do some shopping. :O
10/10: We did a little more shopping during the day, plus some touristy stuff. We ended our day at the top of the Eiffel Tower.
10/11: On to our next stop, Brussels (Belgium). After passing the "break-in" mileage, this was the first time I switched the SQ5 Drive Select into Dynamic mode. The car definitely functions much differently in this mode. I can't wait to get this car back home to test the car without all of the added weight of our luggage in the car.
10/12: On our second day in Brussels, we explored the Atomium and Mini Europe as well as many other parts of the city.
10/13: We drove on to our final destination with our car, which was Amsterdam (Netherlands). We had a good time at the Heineken Experience.
10/14: We dropped off our SQ5 in the morning. Be sure to bring all of the documentation Audi Forum provides. Let's just say the wife removed some documentation I had originally left in the glove box, so we had to go back to our hotel. The whole process takes less than an hour. Afterwards we dropped off the rental car and headed back to downtown by train afterwards. We explored the city and visited the Red Light District at night.
10/15: We spent the morning in Amsterdam, but headed to the airport afterwards. We flew into Iceland. We had dinner in Reykjavic before heading to South Iceland.
10/16 - 10/19: We stayed in South Iceland for two nights to explore the Jokulsarlon Glaciers and Skaftafell National Park. We saw a number of different waterfalls (Skogafoss, Seljalandsfoss, and Gullfoss) and the Geysir geyser. We ended our vacation by relaxing at the Blue Lagoon on the last day before flying back home. Originally I never thought about visiting Iceland, but I just happened to stumble across IcelandAir which provides a free layover up to 1 week, plus their airfare is cheaper than most companies. If you like the outdoors, this place is a MUST SEE. Just by driving around in our rental car, we saw so many different things. We didn't even get a chance to try some of the more adventurous excursions. The only unfortunate thing about Iceland is that we were unable to see the Northern Lights. It just wasn't in the forecast.
The waiting game was no fun. While Audi said it may take 11-13 weeks before our car arrives, it took us less than 8 weeks for our car to go from Amsterdam to Northern California. We just picked up the car last night. I have yet to drive it yet since it came back to the US. It's technically my wife's car, so I let her be the first to drive it home. I can't wait to drive it after work tonight.
12-11-2013, 08:46 AM
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Thanks for sharing your experience. I would love to do a ED, however since the Q5 will be built in Mexico in the next few years, I would need to decide on another model. I wish that I had done it for my current Q5. BTW, the color you chose, or rather your wife's selection is my favorite Audi color. Maybe next time for me.
Yeah I'll have to admit, I'm usually the more boring type when it comes to colors. I thought I was being bold when I went with charcoal on my Lexus. Hahah. My wife's previous car was a BMW 128i. She ended up settling on a baby blue for that car and she regretted all the time not getting that sharp blue similar to the Estoril Blue. She calls it the Superman blue, but it's actually a little darker than that. But after my wife suggested this color and after I saw those initial Auto Showroom pics of the new SQ5, I was SOLD!!! Next was trying to figure out how we could make it happen on our new Audi, since this color is typically only offered on S models. At one point, before we even realized an SQ5 with Estoril Blue was possible, we considered ordering a Q5 and paying the exclusive color price.
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12-11-2013, 09:10 AM
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Yeah, I thought about getting my Q5 in Estoril, but didn't want to swallow the extra charge. I will be trading mine in for the next generation Q, so will likely pass on a Mexican delivery.
But, certainly if the Estoril Blue is still available as a non- exclusive color for the SQ5 in 2016, I am all in!
But, certainly if the Estoril Blue is still available as a non- exclusive color for the SQ5 in 2016, I am all in!
01-02-2014, 05:00 PM
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Great story! I'm currently shopping for my next car and have settled on the SQ5. My dealer in Seattle told me that Audi won't deliver the SQ5 in the winter months because they only sell it with summer tires.
This goes against what I see here, seeing as October is considered a winter month?
Thanks in advance, appreciate the input'
This goes against what I see here, seeing as October is considered a winter month?
Thanks in advance, appreciate the input'
01-03-2014, 09:41 AM
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Great story! I'm currently shopping for my next car and have settled on the SQ5. My dealer in Seattle told me that Audi won't deliver the SQ5 in the winter months because they only sell it with summer tires.
This goes against what I see here, seeing as October is considered a winter month?
Thanks in advance, appreciate the input'
This goes against what I see here, seeing as October is considered a winter month?
Thanks in advance, appreciate the input'
