Horsepower-flush automobiles and the 7,200-mile highway system that accommodates them – called the autobahn – are part and parcel of national mythology in Germany.
But driving on the autobahn, long stretches of which forswear any speed limit at all, can be a chilling experience for the timid.
I’m not a slow driver – and indeed am a native of the US, a country that too mythologizes the open road.
But it’s utterly disconcerting when, ticking along at a brisk 75 miles per hour, somebody blows by me on the left and then disappears over the horizon as if I were driving a lawnmower.
For decades, German drivers (overwhelmingly male ones) have relished this ostensible perk of limitless speed, many in precision-engineered automobiles with such storied names as Volkswagen, BMW and Mercedes Benz.
