Why have I laid down my hard-earned for a four-door Italian shopping car? To answer this effectively, a little background information on my location will be needed. Although I am British, I live in Athens, Greece; a city which presents a variety of driving challenges on a daily basis. Since making progress around its congested roads is like driving along streets liberally spread with Uhu; large-engined cars are often the reserve of the frivolously rich.
Having established that I am not frivolously rich after living with a 250bhp BMW 3-series for a year or so, and its replacement, a Mk1 VW Golf GTi Cabriolet, hitting a certain age a new car was needed, and one that suited the environment a little better. Used cars are a considerable gamble in Greece, as well as being exceptionally expensive, so we started to look at a brand-new car.
Various choices presented themselves, the Renault Clio 197 (or Clio RS as it’s known in Greece), the Ford Fiesta ST, Hyundai’s Coupe, the Suzuki Swift Sport and the Mitsubishi Colt CZT. The Suzuki and the Mitsi were first to be eliminated as they don’t represent the value for money they do in the UK, then went the Coupe for the woeful choice of engines available (the 1.6 or, er, nothing). The Fiesta ST was great, but Ford offered no incentive to the customer for buying a performance vehicle from them, so we didn’t.
The Clio was fantastic. Renault offered a great finance deal and the car was just about everything I wanted, however, it was going to be a stretch of my budget and the performance/mpg was unlikely to be suited to the city. With the Clio dropped, my list was empty and it was back to the drawing board. Hopeful surfing led me to the Fiat website where a banner showing the new Panda caught my eye.
The car was due to be released at the end of 2006 and it seemed to be what I was looking for. After Christmas I took a test drive and loved it, read the reviews and placed an order. My Fiat Panda 100hp will be finished in Darkwave Black with a Skydome, MP3/CD player and the Pandamonio package.