For 26 years, my favorite piece of automotive journalism has been Brock Yates' "Escape From Baja" in the July 1983 Car and Driver (you can download it as a full-color .pdf here...and you really should...scroll to the bottom of the linked page and click on the image).
I mean, really...what could be more fun than 9 frequently inebriated American writers and a photographer driving 8 midsize sedans through inhospitable territory, Biblical weather and (in the case of one of the cars) halfway through a cow before abandoning the trip...and more than $100,000 worth of loaned press vehicles...south of the border (where current press loan documents specifically forbid taking testers)?
Well, it's been a heck of a run, but Brock and the gang (including David E. Davis, Jr, Don Sherman, Jean Lindamood (Jennings), Rich Ceppos, Larry Griffin, Csaba Csere and P.J. O'Rourke) have slipped to #2.
Not having BBC America, I missed Jeremy Clarkson's Top Gear review of the Ford Fiesta until Jalopnik posted it today. If you haven't seen it, trust me...it's worth the 11 minutes it will take to watch it...and the hour you'll spend watching it again with friends. It's epic automotive journalism and great TV.
