Cars In My Life

Over my lifetime I have owned a number of cars. Who hasn’t? My first car was a red 1964 Volkswagen Beetle, which I traded for a VW Fastback. The Fastback was larger, more powerful and would reach speeds of up to 100 mph. That was a huge improvement over the Beetle’s maximum speed of 72 mph (downhill with a tail wind).

We traded the VW Fastback on a Plymouth Fury III. The Plymouth was my first American made car and the first I owned with automatic transmission and air conditioning. That was followed by a big solid black Mercury Grand Marquis.

Since then we have had a mixture of cars in both size and brand. Let’s see we have owned three Datsun/Nissan vehicles which were all good cars. I’ve had two more Mercury Grand Marquis, an old ’56 Chevy, a Chevrolet pick up truck, a Plymouth Reliant, a Plymouth Champ, a Dodge Colt, a Dodge Charger, two Oldsmobile Cutlass’s, and two Ford Taurus’s.

Currently we own a Honda Civic and a four cylinder Toyota Camry.

The most roomy and comfortable cars I ever owned were the Mercury Grand Marquis. The fastest car was the Dodge Charger. It had a speedometer that went to 150 and I believe it would do 150 mph. The fastest I ever had it was between 130 and 135. It was just me and a Pontiac GTO on the highway and we decided to have a little competition. At 130 mph, I left him in the dust and still had plenty of accelerator to call on.

But the best overall car we have owned is the Toyota Camry. It provides a comfortable ride, has a nice sized trunk, is quiet, and has a lot of pick up. Many people think they need at least a 6 cylinder to be fast enough for the highway. The four cylinder Toyota has plenty of pep and is the smoothest transmission I have ever encountered.

I know Toyota is currently having a huge recall. Ours is not in the recall. I think we have 170 thousand miles on it. We’ve changed the oil, put on three sets of tires, and two batteries. It still has the original brakes and has never (knock on wood) had the need for any repair. I’m seriously thinking about trading my Honda Civic for a Toyota Prius and I really believe we will replace the Camry with another. It’s just that good.