2022 August Fort Collins

Friday, August 26

Weather: Warm, partly cloudy, good for travel. A solo trip to Fort Collins to visit Brittany to help her pick out and buy a new car! I drove so I could bring some things from our house to Brittany (table, chairs, TV, Box of tools...). 950 miles and 13 1/2 hours later I was at her place.

Dinner with Brit

Brit showed me her new place, a very nice space with a great view of the natural area and park out back. There are sliding glass doors off the bedroom and a nice balcony. After my tour we went out for BBQ. I had spare ribs Brit had brisket and we shared. Both were very tasty as well as the sides.

Saturday, August 27

Weather:High of 90, low humidty, mostly sunny.

Our goal for the day was to test drive a Kia and Honda Civic, get pricing and availability and buy a new car!

Test Drives and Pricing

It is a very tough time to buy a car. Everything is on allocation and it is tough to even find a car to test drive.

KIA Seltos

The Kia Seltos is a sharp looking compact SUV. Luckily, I found one in the Chicago area about a month ago and got to test drive it. Brittany only drove one of the sales people’s own Seltos so only around the parking lot. The best we could do today was test drive a Soul that has the same engine as the Seltos. We took it out to Horse Tooth and tested its power up hills. Not a problem. After the test drive we sat down and went through the pricing.

Honda Civic

At the Honda dealer they had a used Civic we were able to test drive. We had the car out for an hour and a half! Unfortunately, when we got back to the dealer we found out it was a Civic EX with a turbo so not the engine in the LX she was considering.

Sitting with the sales person we learned some things. Honda was so constrained with new cars they stopped producing the LX in favor of higher end more profitable cars. They only had one Civic Sport coming in the next 2 – 4 months at a higher price and not even the color Brit wanted. Brutal!

Decision

We went to Jersey Mike’s for lunch, did some further research and made a list of criteria to guide her decision. The key criteria were: Price, Safety, Reliability, Sedan vs. SUV, Styling, MPG, FWD vs AWD and availability. I was having fun but I think Brit was pretty stressed out. She was a sport and put up with my spreadsheet like decision matrix!

Brittany decided on the KIA Seltos. It was a good and well informed decision.

Brittany Buys a New Car!

We headed back to the KIA dealership and had a pleasant surprise. They offered $1000 for her trade in vs. the Honda dealer's $250. Rachel wrote up the order. A brand new 2023 KIA Seltos AWD SUV in Steel Grey with no money down which is nice. Now it's hurry up and wait 3 – 5 months for delivery. It's a nice lookin vehicle!

Sunday, August 28

Weather: High of 90, nice breeze, low humidity.

Hikes

Today’s plan is for a fun relaxing day. Went back over to Brittany’s and the last choir we had was to unload the things I had brought. Once that was done we headed to a nearby park and trail along the Poudre river. My favorite part of the hike was sitting on the bench having a nice chat.

After the hike we had lunch at Jason’s Deli. I asked how she felt with her decision after sleeping on it. She said she is excited! We headed back to her place and she took me on a small hike in a nature area and park right out her back door, with trees, prairie and Horse Tooth in the background, awesome! Again, my favorite part of the hike was sitting on a bench with Brit. When we got back Josh was back (and locked out) so I got to say a brief hello before I headed back to the hotel.

Monday, August 29

Heading Home

I left the hotel about 5:40 am and enjoyed watching the sun come up as I was crossing from Wyoming into Nebraska. Colorado(short), Wyoming(short), Nebraska(loonggg), Iowa(long), Illinois(medium).

Home Sweet Home.