Our car experts choose every product we feature. We may earn money from the links on this page.

To discover new land on home soil, only the last great American V-8 could lead the way.

On a recent spring day, my wife, Michelle, walked into my office to find me curled into a ball under my desk.

This story originally appeared in Volume 11 of Road & Track.

SIGN UP FOR THE TRACK CLUB BY R&T FOR MORE EXCLUSIVE STORIES

“Jeez, look at this place,” she said, her eyes scanning the room. Stacks of papers stood three feet high. Empty IPA cans scattered the floor. “What is wrong with you?”

Where do I start? Ukraine. Culture wars. Haters on the internet. Climate change. Inflation. Omicron. My own face in the mirror.

“You know what you need? A road trip,” Michelle said. “When you get like this, you always feel ­better if you can jump in a car and go.”

And there it was: the invitation to take off. I felt the familiar spark of inspiration. What better cure is there for anxiety and ennui? What better way to soothe the soul than to point a car toward an endless horizon and hammer the accelerator? I began to think of the possibilities: If I could escape on a road trip, where would I go? What would I drive?

Then it came to me. Fifteen years earlier, I’d gotten stuck with a broken-down 2005 Ford GT in Elko, Nevada. While stranded, I wandered into a Basque restaurant. There I ate one of the greatest meals of my life: a lamb shank with beans and salad and potatoes and a thousand other little dishes. I’d been dreaming about it ever since. A little Googling revealed that rural Nevada is home to a thriving Basque culture and a mostly undiscovered food scene, all of it just 500 miles away.

I thought about the road that leads there: long stretches of Interstate 80 in remote desert. As far as public roads go, there is no better place in America to worship at the altar of speed than rural Nevada. No traffic, almost no cops. In some stretches you can see a mile or more ahead, so no surprises or speed traps.

Now, I fully support the battery-­powered revolution. But you can’t drive an electric vehicle through Nevada. Where would you charge it? What this road needs is pumping pistons. I could turn the road trip into a celebration—the last hurrah of the American V-8 and the manual transmission.

On a sunny April morning, I kissed my wife goodbye and set out on the road, hoping to restore my sanity, dig into a culinary tradition, and tear up the pavement in the most powerful production Cadillac ever built: the 2022 CT5-V Blackwing.

The stretch of I-80 coming down the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada range feels like an Olympic luge run—windy, steep, fast as hell. The corners compress you into your seat, then slingshot you into short straightaways. You barrel into long sweeping bends without dabbing the brakes, the g-forces threatening to hurl you out your own window. Gradually, the highway flattens into a desert canyon, as stark as it is beautiful. You pass the city of Reno, and then it all disappears—all the traffic, all the worries, all the bullshit.

The first things you notice in the CT5-V Blackwing are the immediacy of the power and the torque curve, or rather the lack of one. The power is instant at low revs and remains steady as you heave toward the 6500-rpm redline. And that sound! This is what an American supercharged 6.2-liter V-8 is supposed to sound like. The one in this car was handmade by a single master builder (Anthony Terry; his signature is on it) at GM’s Bowling Green factory in Kentucky. It’s a masterpiece of outdated technology: aluminum cylinder heads, four-lobe Eaton supercharger, good-old spark plugs, premium gasoline. The Tremec six-speed manual is a joy and a reminder of how much the world is changing. We face not only a future without manual gear shifters, but one without gears at all.

Cadillac claims a 3.7-second sprint to 60 mph in the CT5-V Blackwing, but what’s evident on this wonderfully lonely highway is the acceleration from 80 to 135 mph. It’s instant. Then the carbon-ceramic brakes haul things down to the 80-mph speed limit in a snap. These are the largest disc brakes ever factory-installed in a Cadillac. They come at a cost (a $9000 option), but the fun quotient is immeasurable.

On hundreds of miles of relatively straight highway, it’s hard to imagine a more perfect rear-wheel-drive internal-combustion experience. Power feels endless—668 hp, 659 lb-ft of torque. Straight-line speed is complemented by supreme comfort. My test ride features two interior carbon-fiber trim options (totaling $9330), plus leather seats with custom quilting and carbon-fiber seatbacks ($6090). The 15-speaker stereo makes you think the Who is playing live in the back seats.

Pit stops are frequent, as the CT5-V Blackwing gets 21 mpg on the highway and only 13 mpg in the city. Given the state of our planet, that’s almost criminal. But let’s not worry about that for now; the sun is setting, and the cocktail hour nears. After four and a half hours of highway hammering, the tiny town of Winnemucca appears on the horizon. It’s home to the Martin Hotel, the first stop on this culinary adventure.

Sheepherders from the Basque Country, a region of northern Spain and southern France, first came to rural Nevada in the 19th century. Rooming houses and brothels sprung up in Winnemucca and Elko to cater to the miners and desert itinerants—and they still exist today. Yes, legal brothels. That’s how the Martin Hotel came to be in 1898. It’s no longer a hotel, but a thriving Basque-focused bar and restaurant facing the railroad tracks on the northern edge of Winnemucca. When I arrive at 4:30 p.m. on a Friday, the place is jammed with locals, most of whom work in the mining industry or as ranchers. In small-town bars, strangers are often greeted with skepticism or not at all. This group couldn’t be warmer.

There’s Willie and his wife, Susan, who just bought a new dishwasher, and another guy who proudly shares a photo of his nephew who once played wide receiver for the Detroit Lions. At a table in the dining room sits a Basque family for whom English is a second language. The bartender effortlessly mixes a half-dozen Picon punches at a time; that’s a 19th-­century Basque American cocktail made with a liqueur called Picon Amer, club soda, a little grenadine, and a brandy floater. The Martin Hotel’s owner, John Arant, who has Basque ancestry, bought the place in 2004. He gives me a tour and tells the story of the time he tried to launch a Martin Hotel brand of salad dressing nationally.

“I learned a lot,” he says, smiling. “For one thing, I’m not Paul Newman.”

Finally, it’s time to order some food, and this is when the real magic happens. A salad with John’s almost-famous dressing comes out with a side dish of hot stewed beans. “You’re supposed to heap the hot beans onto the salad,” John explains. A bowl of traditional Basque hominy appears with chunks of sausage. Fried potatoes, a sausage soup, green beans. On the table, a saltshaker holds something called prairie dust, a mix of salt and spices. Finally, a lamb shank makes its landing. It’s bathed in sauce and garnished with shaved raw garlic. I would’ve driven those hundreds of miles just for one bite. You can taste generations of tradition in this fall-off-the-bone lamb.

The following day, I steer the Blackwing toward Elko County, home of the Ruby Mountains and their winding alpine roads. The Rubies are a hidden gem for skiers and backpackers. The snow-covered peaks are breathtaking, capped by Ruby Dome at an elevation of 11,387 feet.

Time to dial in the Caddy. I switch from Tour mode to Sport, and the car’s computers remap the steering, suspension, transmission, and brake response. Then I’m off into Lamoille Canyon. Temperatures are just above freezing, but Michelin Pilot Sport 4S rubber keeps me glued to the road. Cadillac claims its MagneRide 4.0 is “the world’s fastest reacting suspension technology,” and while I can’t verify that, the ride is firm and sure-footed in tricky off-camber turns. The Blackwing’s steering response is as precise as that of anything I’ve driven on public roads. Top speed is over 200 mph, but it’s the quick bursts of muscle where the fun is to be had today.

For years, Cadillac has worked to rebrand its image on the racetrack, and this car affirms that GM is put- ting all that R&D to good use. This is not your grand- pa’s land yacht. It’s a track-ready beast that can stand up to anything from BMW. All in, my test ride’s bill is $113,445, and I can’t think of anything in that price range that could outrun it. But once again, I’m out of gas. Time to hit town.

Outside of Europe, Elkoishometooneofthe most vibrant Basque cultures in the world. The town’s most famous restaurant, the Star Hotel, features a Basque menu and a giant statue of a Basque sheep- herder’s boot out front. On the edge of town stands the Elko Basque Club. All over Elko, you see the Basque lauburu, a hooked cross symbolizing the unity of the Basque people.

Tonight’s dinner is at Ogi Deli, which sits next to a store that sells saddles and spurs. I called ahead, so when I arrive, two bartenders named Jordan and Stacy greet me by name. Jordan starts me off with a sagardoa, which is chilled Basque cider poured using a special aerating technique. Jordan demonstrates by holding the bottle as high as possible and the glass as low as possible. Then he tops off the drink with a rye floater. Next he pours a kalimotxo, a classic Basque refresher of house red wine on the rocks with Coca-Cola and a lime twist. The color curiously resembles the Infrared Tintcoat paint on my Cadillac.

Jordan even brought a special bottle of pacharán liqueur from his private collection at home. While I sip it, he tells me stories of the time he went to the Basque Country in Europe to meet all his relatives. And how the deli owner sometimes delivers as many as 800 Basque sandwiches to the gold miners working outside Elko for lunch.

Then the food arrives: a plate of Basque charcuterie and another of tapas called pintxos. Toast serves as a perfect vehicle for layers of pork loin, paprika aioli, roasted peppers, and melted Basque sheep’s milk cheese. Chorizo Pamplona is cut so thin, it melts on your tongue. A pesto-stuffed cherry tomato and crumbles of blue cheese garnish a toast of sliced turkey. The combo of Basque prosciutto and sweet piquillo pepper makes every one of my taste buds rise for a standing ovation. For the finale, Jordan brings out Gâteau Basque—shortbread stuffed with a cognac custard.

The next day, I aim the Cadillac toward home. I’ve made friends I will see again. I am driving a car so awesome, I will remember it on my deathbed. My faith in humanity is restored. The road trip never fails.