The Nevada desert is home to strange. High speeds, abandoned trailers, Burning Man, prostitution, gambling, alien conspiracies, Feds in Raptor trucks?the state approves all of them. For a limited time, Audi is picking two of these tourist activities for anyone desiring to burn $1200 or so outside Las Vegas.
In yet another PR stunt to put regular mortals into an R8, Audi’s plopped a three-bed, two-bath modular home in Beatty, some 120 miles northwest of Vegas, and shipped in a private chef, pro drivers, and a chauffeured Q7. It’s a midweek retreat for two nights, with a nightly rate conveniently matched to the 610-hp rating in the 2017 R8 V10 Plus.

It’s not the easiest getaway. Only seven bookings are available between October 10 and November 1, none are on weekends, there’s a 50 percent penalty for canceling, and you must compete against other travelers on Airbnb between now and Saturday, with a single future booking being accepted each night at 9 p.m. Eastern time. And no, you cannot bring dogs or have a party in the room.
If selected?and we’d be super jealous had we not already run RS7s through Death Valley at unpublishable speeds a couple of years ago?you’ll be pampered just like a real auto journalist. Touch down in Las Vegas, get whisked away curbside in a Q7, settle into luxurious surroundings while dinner’s prepared, wake up to drive the R8 in the sand and on the road, eat another enormous dinner, fly home.

Lightning L...