Samoth

Well that was a very busy and social weekend that was.

Arrived at the ninjagirl's annoyingly late on Friday due to having to stay in Brighton to go to acupuncture. On the plus side, the acupuncture seems to be actually causing my longstanding lurgi to improve finally - I've been ill for over 4 months now, and I'm quite tired of it. This actually seems to be helping, which is more than all the stuff that the doctors have prescribed me over the last few months (and the three entirely different diagnoses I've had...)

Jumped (well crawled) out of bed on Saturday morning to go and collect the lovely jenova_red from the station, drop her stuff off, and then head to Bristol to go to the Zoo with kissycat1000 and family, including ev1ldonut and azekeil.

A pleasant day of wandering in the cold but sunny weather, and taking many many photos followed. As soon as I have five minutes I'll be sticking them up online for your viewing pleasure. Was nice to photogeek with ev1ldonut, although most of it was of the "damn, it's so dark in here and you can't use flash" nature, so it was ISO 3200 all the way, and noise galore I expect... NoiseNinja time for anything worth the effort I suspect :)

We left the Zoo just as it was starting to get a bit more dark and chilly, so the timing was good. Then back to Hanka's for some chilling out and foodage, before heading over to sebastian_lux's housewarming, where after driving round in circles trying to find the house for some time, we ran into kissycat1000 and ev1ldonut just leaving, who were able to point us in the right direction.

The party was most pleasant, was good to put some faces to names I've only previously known on LJ/IRC (who I'm far too vague to list all of right now). I'm glad I skipped the punch, due to driving, and a desire to retain my liver function. I had fun geeking with azekeil and aoakley - happy discussions of the bad old days of the internet pre-aol especially :)

We staggered home quite early due to being knackered after the zoo, which left us time to try and break Jen's brain with only a small selection from Hanka's vast collect of disturbing AVIs. I think she just about survived...

Sunday involved staggering out of bed and putting Jen back on the train to sunny Birmingham, and then heading out to go and look at some cars.


I've been enjoying my Batmobile a great deal for the last 18 months or so, but the change in my lifestyle (being too ill to cycle to work, and visiting Hanka every other weekend or so) has meant I've gone from 500 odd miles a month to more like 1500. At 20-23MPG, this is getting rather painful to afford, so it's got to go :(

I have a long and random list of things to look at, with the main criteria being 'high MPG' and 'comfortable down motorways'. I'm hoping to lose the commuting bit of the equation as my health gradually returns).

The first visit of the day was to the BMW dealer, where I wanted to have a look at some 4/5 year old 320D, 525D and 530D models their website suggested they had in stock. Annoyingly, the only one they actually had there on the day was the 320D, but we did have a chance to have a sit in a similar age, non-diesel 5 series. Unfortunately they also had only one member of staff on duty too, so I wasn't able to take anything for a test drive, but I've arranged to do so the next time I'm in Cheltenham.

I was pretty underwhelmed by the interior of the 3 series, I was suprised how plain and spartan it all was. The 5 series at least felt a bit more like a 'luxury' car, but I was still kinda surprised by how understated it all felt - I think I've got rather spoiled by the interior of the RX-8. The proof of the pudding is in the driving though, so I'm reserving judgement on them until I've had a chance to have a go. I'm not particularly keen on the 3 series from that visit though, so I think the 530D SE, and and the 525D Sport are what I'll be looking to have a test drive in next time.

Then it was off down the road to the Toyota dealer to have a go in the utterly whacky Petrol/Electric Hybrid Prius (yes, I like cars with weird engines). We were able to actually go for a proper test drive in this. It's an odd beasty, it all feels very spaceagey. You get in, stick the keyless entry lump into a hole in the dashboard, and then push a 'Start' button, and lots of lights light up and *nothing* happens. No engine start, no nothing :) Drive off in full electric mode in total silence - as you accelerate hard, or once you get above 30odd MPH, the petrol engine starts automatically (and very quietly) and starts contributing into the mix - when it's not needed, it switches itself off again.

It's very odd to drive, your brain keeps insisting you've stalled it at traffic lights. It's pretty magic round town where you're in electric mode a lot, acceleration from the electric drive is really rather good, and it's all quite nice and nippy. Down the motorway, it's rather more like driving a normal petrol automatic, but it cruises along pretty happily and still has enough grunt to overtake at speed if need be. It does lead to a fairly understated driving style if you want all that potential economy actually delivered.

I remain a bit unsure about the Prius, as round town/mixed driving the economy is fantastic, but it's much less impressive down motorways - and half my reason for doing this is because of doing lots of motorway driving - I hope to lose the round town stuff once my health improves. So a diesel will still beat it for economy on the motorway by some way.

In the near future I'm going to have a play with the VW Golf TDI (preferably with the whacky DSG gearbox as it interests me) and see what that's like. The Honda Accord diesel is supposed to be worth a look too.

Any of you petrolheads have any suggestions for anything else I should be looking at for comfortable, economical, reliable motorway bashing? I have an irrational hatred of Fords for no particularly explicable reason, so don't suggest them :)


Phew, that was a bit epic, zoo photos to follow soon.