2022 McLaren 765LT

LOS ANGELES — A sunny L.A. spring day is the ideal complement to taking possession of a nearly $500,000, Ambit Blue McLaren 765LT Spider. Add to that an hours-long midday stint on a nearly empty Angeles Crest Highway and a recipe is crafted for a nearly utopic automotive experience. The presence of my boyfriend in the right seat was the proverbial cake frosting, save for the fact that he dislikes convertibles and driving quickly. We compromised. If he would join me for the ride, I would attend a museum tour with him at the Lanterman House in La Cañada Flintridge – a suburban town at the road’s western terminus – and treat him to lunch afterward. Drive, Discover, Dine: Date Day.  Dr. Jacob Lanterman moved to sunny Southern California from dreary western Michigan in the early part of the 20th century, seeking and espousing the health benefits – and relief from pulmonary illnesses like tuberculosis – believed to be offered by the lovely weather and fresh air. He became a major landholder in the Crescenta Valley, at the base of the San Gabriel mountains, built himself and his family a 10,000-square-foot Arts and Crafts-style home out of concrete and steel in 1915 to defend against the fire and earthquakes he’d witnessed in San Francisco, and began subdividing and selling parcels. But the valley’s lack of access to a year-round water supply choked the process. His grandson, Frank, who lived in the house for his entire life, became a long-serving Republican California state assemblyman, and managed to pass legislation allowing the town access to the same fresh water supply that served Los Angeles, ushering into his pockets loads of cash, and ushering into the valley sprawl, traffic, and smog. Rep. Lanterman countered by introducing the nation’s first legislation mandating pollution reduction devices on cars. California thus became the first state to create tailpipe emissions standards, and require the componentry needed to scrub (some) harmful soot and fumes from the always-inefficient burning of fossil fuels. (Frank sponsored many less helpful initiatives as well.) Speaking of the inefficient burning of fossil fuels, the McLaren 765LT Spider, which is able to pump 91 octane through its mid-mounted twin-turbocharged 4.0-liter V8 and produce 755 horsepower. And while it sports four gargantuan exhaust portals – lined up (and sounding) like the business end of a mortar – it at least spews far less air-corrupting garbage into the atmosphere than your grandmother’s LeSabre thanks to those tailpipe emissions standards, which allow the air surrounding Angeles Crest, while not perfectly clear, to generally no longer feel like grime stew. This was a bonus for me during my reverential drive up and down the highway, as deep breathing is requisite when piloting a half-million dollars worth of peak British exotic through about 1,000 hairpin turns already occupied by hostile bicyclists, ripping motorcyclists, tumbling granite and suicidal wildlife. It is difficult to enunciate the perfection of the 765LT Spider. I could critique the extortionate pricing like the $730 car cover, …
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