Taycan

Make
Porsche
Segment
Sedan

There's an endless list of bucket list drives car lovers need to complete before they die. The more famous examples include the Stelvio Pass, the North Coast 500 in Scotland, the Nurburgring Nordschleife in Germany, and the Tail of the Dragon in the USA.

There are also some unknown but equally majestic drives many people don't know about, like the Slaaihoek Pass in South Africa and the K2K in India. A group of motoring journalists in India recently completed the latter in Porsche Taycan.

The K2K is a nearly 2,500-mile drive from Kashmir in the north to Kanniyakumari in the south, over varied and tricky terrain in unpredictable conditions. Not the kind of trip you'd associate with an electric Porsche, as India's roads require something more robust and intimidating, like a Cayenne Turbo.

But that's what made the trip so interesting. Driving a Cayenne 2,500 miles is hardly an accomplishment, but asking a stock-standard Taycan to do the same is impressive. The journalists from Autocar India also saw it as a fitting way to celebrate the magazine's 23d anniversary.

"The electric car is, relatively speaking, still quite a new mode of transport in India," explains Gavin D'souza, Autocar's Digital Editor and one of four staff members who shared the driving. "A lot of people are both excited by it and a little fearful, and of course their biggest fear is range. So we set out to prove that with a little bit of planning and foresight, you can do over 4,000 km (2,485 miles) in an electric car. And of course, the Taycan added a bit of dynamism. If you're doing the K2K in an electric car, why not do it in one that's exciting?"

To complete the trip, the journos had to cross 10 of India's 28 states. The charging network isn't nearly as sophisticated as it is here. The team had to rely on a community-driven charging app instead of more intelligent systems introduced by Electrify America and Tesla.

The various states provided a wide range of topography, with a mixture of mountains, plateaus, deserts, and cities, as seen in the images. The Taycan did some impressive water crossing, though Porsche does not go as far as saying it can be used as a boat.

"As we closed in on Mumbai the challenge suddenly became very real," recalls Assistant Editor Jay Patil, "because the roads had been completely washed away in the monsoons. Thankfully, all Taycan models in India are fitted with Smartlift and that saved us on quite a few occasions. In Punjab, it even went through water that was above door level, which did make us worry in an electric car, but the Taycan just handled everything."

The epic trip took the team two weeks to complete, including a two-day stopover in Mumbai and one lost day at the start. A landslide washed away a chunk of the planned route, which halted progress.

"This was not a race against time, and that felt good. We enjoyed the car and enjoyed the journey. And I never thought I'd say this, but I really enjoyed pushing the efficiency of the Taycan, and even managed 7.1 km per kWh on some of the straighter sections of the trip," said D'souza.

Road tester Rahul Kakar followed the Taycan in a support vehicle, which was never needed.

"I was in the support car throughout," says Kakar, "and from there, seeing how the Taycan managed to take on roads that were washed away completely was a great thing to watch. And on that last day, when we arrived in Kanniyakumari, it was magical, because the road there is surrounded by wind turbines. So seeing the Taycan driving through there was almost ceremonial. It was an amazing thing to watch."