Hard to believe that we've had this Dodge Caravan now nearly 14 years, but one look at the odometer and we can tell it's been driven. A lot.
200,000 miles. In 14 years. That makes ... wait a minute, let me do the math...
14,286 miles per year, on average.
That really is an average, too. We drove a lot more than 15,000 miles per year back when we lived in Seattle - which was the first four or five years we had the car. We did an awful lot of commuting to Seattle from our little home in Everett.
Once we moved to Grand Rapids, though, our commute dropped like a rock. From 30 miles to town, it's now 10 or so. Church is only three miles. The stores are three miles. Work is five miles. I used to drive over an hour one-way to work, but it's been ten minutes, tops, for the past ten years.
Saved us an awful lot of wear and tear on that car.
But I'm not sure how many more miles we're going to get out of it. The salted winter roads of Michigan are harsh on the metal, rusting away the undercarriage faster than you can imagine. Won't be too long before we're going to need another vehicle. And I'm sure Cheryl has her eye on something completely different now that the kids are grown up and we don't ride together in the van much anymore.
I wonder what she'll pick?
200,000 miles. In 14 years. That makes ... wait a minute, let me do the math...
14,286 miles per year, on average.
That really is an average, too. We drove a lot more than 15,000 miles per year back when we lived in Seattle - which was the first four or five years we had the car. We did an awful lot of commuting to Seattle from our little home in Everett.
Once we moved to Grand Rapids, though, our commute dropped like a rock. From 30 miles to town, it's now 10 or so. Church is only three miles. The stores are three miles. Work is five miles. I used to drive over an hour one-way to work, but it's been ten minutes, tops, for the past ten years.
Saved us an awful lot of wear and tear on that car.
But I'm not sure how many more miles we're going to get out of it. The salted winter roads of Michigan are harsh on the metal, rusting away the undercarriage faster than you can imagine. Won't be too long before we're going to need another vehicle. And I'm sure Cheryl has her eye on something completely different now that the kids are grown up and we don't ride together in the van much anymore.
I wonder what she'll pick?
1 comment:
and we have 302,000 on our 2000 Buick. Have to put some money into it now and then but it is still on the original engine and transmission. Just spent $300 to replace the broken right door handle (your dad was tired of reaching across to open my door and I was tired of waiting in the cold) and $900 to replace some wiring in the steering column because the right turn signal wouldn't work. I guess that is better than car payments on what I would like to be driving,
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