I’ve paid the deposit, waited for a roadworthy, and now I’ve got the keys in hand. So … what happens now?
A huge amount of trepidation follows me out of the car yard as the Explorer meets the Princes Highway. It’s a road I’ve driven thousands of times, but it feels a touch more delicate in a car I don’t yet trust. Hell, I don’t even trust the paper the roadworthy is printed on. It feels dodgy. Nerves set in.
And they do such a good job that I find myself parked up in a car wash with nothing working, and me in a mild panic. Turns out I’d driven too far forward *eye roll*, so it’s a quick fix. But I did consider that maybe I had Wonder Woman’s invisibility shield on. That, or I’d done something really bad, killed the car wash and would kill the car on the way out. Basically, my default setting. Thanks, Brain.
Nevertheless, water was soon splashing around into the Explorer.
“We pressure tested it, it’s watertight,” said the car salesman not an hour earlier.
Stares in ridiculous.
I’m not talking the foaming, gushing water of Titanic’s 3rd Class flooding and Leo rattling the chains, just a few drops. It’s a minor inconvenience, but still frustrating. I guess it’s all part of getting to know a new car - and better to know now then 12 months and an expensive wrap later. You know what the fab part was though? I rolled on out of Industrial Avenue with a clean car, and it feels good. Even if the heater was set to Sol 437 and I couldn’t work out how to switch it off.
That photo you scrolled past at the top of the page? It was the best of a random bunch I took in the car park of Werribee Football Club. It had foliage (tres Jurassic), a wire fence, and not a whole lot of people around. And of course we took it to the extreme, modelling the car with its #inspo.
I’m so excited I could shit.
I was expecting a more tempered response when I got the car home. Shane and I are in the process of building a house - and living with my parents - so it would be easy to say we should have a one track mind about where out money goes. But they were kind of cool. It feels like it’s grabbed Dad’s interest, and we’ve already started having a poke around under the bonnet to see what’s going on.
For once, I’m glad for the anti-climax.
Next Up: And the tour moves on …
