This car really turned out to be much more car than I originally was looking for. I started out looking for a 2-wheel drive with leather seating, then Terry wanted a moonroof and V6, and then I just had to have a navigation package (that's another story), and it had to be red. With the options we wanted it kind of narrowed it down to either the Sport or the Limited model. Since the Sport model only came with black interior, which I did not want, my choice was simple, it had to be the Limited. The problem was that apparently Toyota doesn't make very many Limiteds and when they do, the vehicles are usually loaded out to the max with additional options such as 4-wheel drive, tow package, backup camera, etc., etc. Our salesman was only able to find one Barcelona Red Limited with the options I wanted, plus it also had the aforementioned extra options I didn't necessarily want but am sure I will enjoy them none the less.
Then there is the story about the navigation system. A year and a half ago Terry and I went on a two week trip through California with our friends Martha, of "Armchair Travel with Martha" fame, and her husband Jim in their Prius and Daisy, their onboard navigation system. I knew right away that I just had to have a navigation system in my next car. It was just too cool how it guided us all over California. I could already see how useful that would be to us since we were planning a lot of road trips now that I'm retired. It was a small price to pay if it helps keep the peace. It's not easy trying to be the navigator when we are speeding along at 80 miles per hour and the road signs are going by so fast it's hard to read them, all the while trying to read a map where the print is getting exceedingly smaller and smaller the older I get. I can see how it would be extremely helpful in the bigger cities where we are totally in unfamiliar territory (it is otherwise useless in our small town of Columbus). Now then, I think I have thoroughly justified the extra expense of the NAV package, don't you?
