Went to Orlando, FL as the wife had never been there (FL) before. Decided to take the Prius (05) as I'm pretty much disgusted with air travel these days. The drive down was fairly wet as the eastern part of the US seemed to inundated with rain. Fayetteville had very bad storms and was creating havoc on I95.
Finally arrived in Orlando and we scheduled Blue Man Group, Circus du Soleil, and a dinner theater featuring the Rat Pack and friends. That Monday, we decided to go to a Toyota dealer and look at the newer Prius. We weren't going to buy anything, we were just looking. There were Prius Cs, the normal sized Prius, and the V. The V is the larger of the three and is more like a wagon as far as space goes. The sales guy offered a test drive and I absolutely refused knowing full well what would entail. Anyway, the pickings were slim as far as colors in the mid-range and the C was out of the question....just to darn small for us. I didn't want to buy the V as it was more expensive... Guess what we bought? The V. My wife had liked those from the get go and truthfully what sold it was the color....sea glass. It's a mixture of blue/green and kind of looks retro to me. It would make a good color for the C14.
We got 2k for the old Prius, which I thought wasn't bad considering the following: Needed a valve adjustment as the engine was clattering like a sewing machine $1k (similar effort in doing a C14 adjust). It had nearly 300, 000 miles on it. It needed a brake job (original pads still on it). The traction batteries were nearing 10 years of life $1500+. There were funny noises coming from within the dash that my wife had just made me aware of (she's the primary driver). And it was complaining about the catestrophic converter... I essentially said take it please.
So they were having a sale and the price wasn't bad. We left with a new Prius. It would have been cheaper to fly down there in retrospect... The combined mpg was 42 and with my driving style I'm getting about 48-50 showing on computer. After driving it for a week I really like it. It's got 16 inch wheels and a larger engine (1.8L) (hydraulic lifters, I think). You can definitely tell you're driving a larger car. It's got three driving settings (Evo, Eco, and Power). Evo is just on battery, eco is well economical and power is what you think it might be. Eco works fine for me, though.
Oil change is 10k miles and uses 0w-20 oil. The oil filter is retro and similar to the filter on the C10, uses a cartridge instead of spin on. Not sure I like that feature. Didn't like it on the C10. I think they have a more expensive spin on filter which is what I'll probably use eventually after the free oil changes expire.
The farkeling has begun. I've ordered a Homelink auto dimming mirror, floor mats, and mud guards. There's more to come, though.
Now I'm stuck with two rotors, front brake pads, and an oil filter left over from the 05. They won't fit the new one, unfortunately. I'll sell them on Craigs list, I think.
On the way back we camped at a Hampton in Fayetteville. The desk clerk wanted to know the color. I said sea glass and we looked at each other and both laughed at the same time...
The color looks more blue than green in the picture, but to me it looks more green than blue in person.
