In the end - we took their shuttle home (they even put down the seats in the back to take our bikes home with us to) as their pressure sensor broke and we're waiting till tomorrow morning for them to run all the pressure tests and tell us whether it's a $2,200 repair, or a much more exciting $1,600 repair!!!
In the meantime - D's been playing with my calculator... which is never a good thing.
We drive about 38,000 miles a year. Considering how long we owned Josey and what we paid for her - if we retired her right now, she'd have cost us $100 a week to drive (not counting regular maintenance... which, considering she was our house for like eight months - isn't too bad, but still seems like a lot).
When you break it down and average it out - that's 675 miles we drive each and every week!!!
Which means we've paid 15 cents per mile... just for the car - not counting the gas, new tires, filters, fluids....
Anyway - on the more positive spectrum - if we do this fix and manage to drive her another six months, the fix would have paid for itself by our current rate. Seems reasonable.
D was also looking at various other cars (and whether - if we bought another car right now, we'd get a big fat SUV or a happy fuel efficient car). The biggest issue here being that currently, we can sleep in the back of our Josey - in fact, we can drive her down the worst, cruddy roads in the middle of a thunderstorm (though in the desert that wouldn't be smart), stop where ever we want, climb in the back and go to sleep without even getting out of the car and getting wet...
which is nice.
However - at our current rate of driving, if we bought a Prius, we could pay for 90 nights in a hotel room in Moab during the off-season, or, like 45 nights in a hotel room anywhere, with the money we'd save on gas...
hmm... the again - they don't often have hotel rooms where we spend the night...
too much to think about (Prius batteries still haven't been perfected, etc) plus, ideally we'd want something in between, something with decent gas mileage, decent ground clearance, decent cargo space, etc... but that doesn't exist - and why???
Because of what car companies are offering in the United States.
What happened to Subaru??? What happened to Volkswagen???
D used to have a Forrester that we both adored - but the Forrester he got nine years ago got better actual mileage than what they report on their site for their '08s. Oh - and the Jetta we used to have - got like 8 mpg better than what VW is reporting for their '08s.
You know what car I really want???
A Volkswagen Golf BlueMotion. 52mpg. Diesel. Know what I'd have to do to get one???
Move to Germany!!!
5 comments:
I am so with you. The lack of availability of US diesel's sucks.
In our case, we have a big family and want to haul everyone economically. As these kids grow that will mean a full size van. The GM van that most appeals to me does not offer a diesel in their people hauler version. Stupid. Big vehicles are where the diesel shines.
Looks like I will have to pony up 10K more for the Dodge sprinter if it is still around in a year or two. The diesel is the diffeence between 13 mpg and 22mpg, if you are hauling 7 folks, not bad mileage.
Final note: lots of emphasis on getting everything locally food, etc. How about recreating locally as an eco friendly idea.
You guys need to move.
Running higher lubricity B-10 in the summer and B-2 diesel in the winter we average ~ 55 in our Beetle (tdi) and 45 in the Jetta Wagon (tdi). I thought the mileage would suck last weekend when Guitar ted and I did T.I. recon but running a mix of B-5 and 30% #1 diesel, we averaged 53 mpg over with some idling time as the temp was -10F. No ground clearance with either car.
$100 a week thats alot of plane tickets and burritos or poping for gas in buddies cars =)
Couldn't live the way i do and travel the way i do making only 17k a year and own a car.
Hopfully you get it all figured out... If you move to denver I can show Dave lotsa good riding/running with just a $4 buss ticket
d.p. - that's great, I'm in love!!! D said there was a Jetta Wagon, but we couldn't find it listed on their site yesterday - and I didn't see anything about Jetta diesel... apparently you have to ask... I just went back and used the search feature and it all came up :)
Mr. Rat - why you just gonna show D the good trails??? I wanna come too!!!
just say the word.... I'll be happy to show you as well!
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