Still Cruising After All Of These Years

Well, it had to happen. We've hit that 5 year mark that's the upper limit on Steve's boredom threshold. Naturally this means it's time to change cars. Again.  I was blissfully unaware that this also meant I had to change MY car as well.

The clear coat was starting to go on the paintwork on the Cruiser, and there were a few other minor niggles that were starting to get on Steve's nerves (one being that I hated driving it), and the paintwork is shot on my Mazda and it had a few overheating issues, so he decided it was time to sell the Cruiser AND my Mazda.  The plan was to replace them with a 2nd generation Prado (which would be predominantly my daily driver) and a dual cab 4WD ute that could be loaded up with the trail bikes or taken to the boat ramp.

Not one to let the grass grow under his feet, Steve started looking in mid-January, and had found a 2005 Ford Courier in no time at all.  As we hadn't even advertised the Cruiser, we had no intentions of actually buying a replacement just then, but it turned out to be too good of a bargain (they were asking $4500 but we got it for $3500) to pass up.

 Bargain ute

Having 3 cars was not exactly part of the plan, so we had to get a move on selling the Cruiser and Mazda. I didn't want to sell my car until I had a replacement to drive, so the Cruiser had to be first to go.  It took just over a month, but we sold it for $19000, which was only just under what we were hoping for. 

 Bye-bye 100 Series

Steve already had a firm idea of what model Prado he was after, so we knew we'd have to extend our home loan a little to get the extra money we'd need.  We test drove several, both manual and automatic, before finding the right one.  It's a 2003 model, manual, 3 litre inter-cooled turbo diesel with 107000 on the clock.  It's a little older than the 05-06 models we'd been looking at, but those low kms and the immaculate condition really sold us on it, and Steve got the car yard down to the price of $24000, drive away.

Our new Landcruiser Prado

It is an absolute dream to drive AND I get to park in the garage, lol.  What could be better than that?  Well, selling my Mazda would help.  We just have to get a road worthy and give it a good wash and polish - not that doing that will help all that much, lol.  Let's face it. Anyone buying it will not be buying it for looks.  The clear coat is so stuffed that it's gone white and flaky (OMG my car has dandruff!), it's covered in hail dents and scratches from supermarket trolley run-ins, but it IS reliable and economical. It would make a great second car for someone who just uses it for daily running to and from the train station or the local shops.  I will NOT be telling potential buyers that it is an imaginary car, though. After all, nobody warned me!

Edit 10 April:
Sold my Mazda!  Our mobile mechanic has bought it as he has a friend who wants it but doesn't have the money right now.  After subtracting the cost of the things that needed to be addressed to pass the roadworthy from the potential sale price of $1000, we have come out of it with $750, which has been spent on having a flash new Alpine stereo (or Mobile Media Station, as it says on the box) installed in the Prado.  All touch screen controls and capable of playing movies, and we've also had a reversing camera hooked up to the screen.  Not sure that all that swanky tech is completely necessary, but somebody had his heart set on it.