1:06 am, February 28, 2011
EVER been tempted to buy your first car again? I have. In fact it’s becoming a bit of an obsesion. It’s something I just can’t stop thinking about however hard I try.
Back when I was 17, my brother ran a small independent car garage. Every Saturday I’d pop down there in my mum’s smoky 306 1.9XLD and lust after the cherry red D-reg Fiesta XR2 he had on the lot. With its pepper pot alloys and black sideskirts it looked the bees knees and I had to have it.
Insurance was always going to be a problem but when I managed to get a joint policy with my old man which bought the premium down to a manageable monthly outlay it made purchase simply a matter of when not if.
A deal was struck with my brother and I spent two years enjoying every £5 worth of fuel I could afford to put in it. It was the car I took my eventual wife out in for our second date. In fact it’s a miracle we ever got up the aisle after I spun the XR2 on a slippery corner and nearly dumped us both into a river in the process…
Still, I loved that Fiesta – even remember the reg, D220 FPR – and could have cried when I had to give it away. Yes, give. As a junior journalist I simply couldn’t afford the leaded fuel (remember that?) it had an unhealthy appetite for and I’ll never forget the day he and my dad came up to my flat and swapped it for a D-reg 1.1-litre Popular Plus with white hubcaps and only four gears…
Since that day I’ve wanted another. The desire has come and gone over the years, but lately it’s started to build a little stronger.
HUNT
The eBay searches have begun. The Auto Trader hunt is on. Thing is, Fiesta XR2s are a bit hard to come by these days. Most are over 20 years old and have suffered a hard life. Many ended up being hammered around the UK’s stock car tracks, lots were ruined by boy racers while others have been ravaged by rust.
And it seems there are quite a few people like me out there that want to relive their youth. Prices range from £1,500 to more than £5,000 for a really clean, low mileage example. That’s just mad, but shows the demand that’s out there.
There is one hurdle to overcome though: getting it past the wife. She’s not impressed with my plans. The conversation went a little like this:
Me: I want an XR2 again.
Wife: Why? We’ve got nowhere to store it, you’ve got no time to drive it, and you’ve got far better things to spend your money on. Like me.
I took that as a definite maybe and set about searching for insurance. There are certain advantages to getting old and insurance quotes are one of them. Now insurers don’t laugh when I ring them up but instead say sensible things like ‘£300 fully comp, sir’.
Oh and there have also been the warnings. It won’t be as good as you remember, they were rubbish and still are, you’ll look like you’re having a mid-life crisis – all of which pretty much sum up the ‘advice’ friends and the Twitter-verse have dispensed.
But you know what? I’m not sure I care. Ok, it might not be as good as I remember it, and it might get used as much as the bread maker we’ve got at the back of a cupboard in the kitchen, but I’ve got to do it before they get too expensive, or I become too old/boring to be tempted…
At least that’s what I keep telling myself… I’m currently negotiating with a seller for a deal on the car you see in these pictures. If he’ll let it go for a sensible price it might just be worth taking the wife’s anger. Wish me luck.
