At last, a follow-up to my previous blog, all about my search for a new car. After the great soul search, research and going around in circles….Should it be a hybrid or full electric? I finally took the bull by the horns, or the steering wheel in my grip and decided on a full electric vehicle…an EV.
This did narrow the field somewhat, but still left lots of lovely cars to choose from. After test drives, more research and talking to EV owners, I came to the conclusion that most, if not all, of the EVs out there are really good. Though I started with the idea of wanting a small car for me around town, I had evolved into the idea that no, this should become our main car for local and long distance. So a larger car, but not too large.
It came down to my completely unbiased car vibes. Not all dealers are created equal: one dealer said I would need to pre-order with a non-refundable deposit, but there was no car available for test drive, a 6-week wait and the car would be white! I think that they did not want another tiresome customer. Then there was the dealer where I had a fixed appointment time, with a salesperson, but when I got there, he was ‘busy with a customer,’ and it was not me! Well, what was I? Oh, I guess just a woman with money in hand to buy a car that day!
So I went to Hyundai, and a lovely saleslady looked after me, straight away, I called my husband to come for a test drive, he went back to work and I bought a car. (I had not been to Hyundai until then, as our other car is a Hyundai, and I thought I should be more original)
Early May, I had a big birthday, one of the zero ones. The birthday was on a Monday, and we had a party the day before on Sunday. Come Monday, feeling a great relief that the party had gone so well, I just trotted out and ended the day with my new Ioniq 5. It is a lovely misty blue. Yes, it was above my original budget, but hey, it was my birthday. Larger and posher, not over the top, but nicely so.
And now comes the next phase of the process. It is a charm to drive, but the challenges are far from over. Learning how to manage that whole Infotainment panel. All the devious and tortuous ways to find your radio station, the heating and the AC and understanding the various warning sounds, like ‘stay in your lane, lady!’ I had been driving my Honda Civic 2003 standard all these years, and that little baby was highly functional in its simplicity.
We also have the whole charging adventure. We will get a home charger installed later this week. But in the meantime, I have been braving public charging places. This is great practice and experience, and it all involves apps: where to find the charging points, what kind they are and then to pay.
And and, it kept going, I needed to sell my little Honda Civic 2003. It is a standard, and I knew there were people who loved standard, I just needed to find them. And in the end, by word of mouth, I sold baby blue with no problem. Good thing too: free up space in the garage and cancel that insurance policy…because the fancy new one costs a lot more to insure.
This past weekend, we cleared out and cleaned out the garage so we would not feel too embarrassed when the electrician came to install the charger. So, the honeymoon was over for Ioni, laden with garbage bags of empties for the bottle depot and various items for Goodwill, she had to get going and really earn her keep!