bamboo wednesday! part 21! and a Pontiac Grand Prix review!

although i do have a picture from what should have been last week's bamboo wednesday post, i uploaded it to my laptop rather than my work PC, which is where it's waiting right now.


i've been on holidays for the better part of the last week. thanks to Dalton McGuinty, many ontario residents got to have a holiday on monday, so i extended that holiday all the way to wednesday the week before. why not eh?

i rented a car to go on a road trip this past weekend, and inspired by Martini's review of his Acura CSX loaner, here's my review of the Pontiac Grand Prix that i rented.

to start off, the car was much larger than anything i've driven in recent years. and although a larger car does not necessarily make a more comfortable car, it certainly seemed to help in the case of the Grand Prix.

it took me a few minutes to figure out how to adjust the seat settings. the driver's seat is all automatic and mechanical, a luxury that i am most definitely not used to. other interesting luxury features were the inclusion of steering wheel mounted audio controls, cruise control, headlights that would automatically turn on based on how light or dark it is outside and a stereo whose volume automatically adjusts based on how fast the car is driving.

and fast i drove. the 200 hp 3.8 liter v6 engine made for some quick and responsive acceleration. hopping from 110 km/h to 150 km/h to pass old ladies on the highway was no problem at all.

although the volume and sound quality from the 6 speaker CD stereo were quite admirable, i was disappointed by the fact that an MP3 CD player or auxiliary audio jack (for my iPod) were not included).

fuel consumption was mediocre at best though. although i didn't track the exact amount of mileage, i would estimate that i drove in the area of about 750 km and spent $67 in gas at $1.05 per liter, a guestimate of about 11-12 liters per 100 km. with a Toyota Yaris as my regular car, i think i'm a little spoiled since even on the worst of days it barely breaks past 7.5 liters per 100 km (with the air conditioner running). from what i've been told, my gas consumption compared to other similarly sized cars is on par.

my main complaint other than the stereo was that actually entering the car seemed a little cramped. once you were sitting in the car, there was ample space, but it seemed that actually getting into the car could present an issue to someone with back or knee problems. all in all, it was a fun car to drive, give one a try.

more details to follow on what actually happened on my holiday later.