My wife and I returned last night from our first weekend getaway in the XKR…the third intended use for the new car! We had a great time, and the car was such an integral part of that. We had bought concert tickets for the Windborne Symphony playing the music of ‘The Who’ at Casino Rama in the picturesque town of Orillia, Ontario. It’s surrounded by lakes, resorts and cottages in the heart of a popular tourist and vacation area just north of Toronto. The weekend weather was clear, sunny and cool so we left the roof up. The convertible’s smallish trunk easily swallowed our two over-night bags, suit bag, and the back seat provided convenient access for jackets, camera, purse, snack bag, etc. Perfect!

With a quick and easy programming of the Nav and loading a few CDs we were off, selecting a route option of 2 lane secondary highways. I filled up and reset the trip computer the day before when doing some running around and getting the car washed. I hadn’t done a mileage check before and thought this would be a good opportunity to determine a “touring” usage. I now use cruise control religiously to preserve my licence’s few remaining demerit points, and set it for 6 mph over posted limits most of the time. Over the course of the 3 days the car made numerous stops and cold starts at restaurants, attractions, hotel, Casino and averaged over 23 miles per gallon for the trip, down from over 26 for the highway section before all the stops once we got there. That also included a few bursts of acceleration…a shameless and harmless display of the car’s awesome nature. My wife just smiles and rolls her eyes…boys and their toys! Did I mention the sound of that exhaust when you unleash 510 hp of direct injected fury…it’s like an enema for the mind!

So along the way Deb adjusted her 16 way’s, saved as Memory 1, and adjusted her climate control zone and seat ventilation as desired. She charged her phone, connected the i-pod, looked up a number on the web, and I made a call using the car’s info display to dial and then via car mic and Bluetooth. This was all while listening to Sarah McLaughlin, the Doobie Brothers, and the CD sound track from Dirty Dancing through the excellent B&W sound system. The interior is so damn sumptuous you just don’t want the trip to end. When it did, and my wife recounted all the things we had enjoyed over the weekend, driving in the Jaaag was a real highlight. One of the three purposes we purchased the XKR for was to do this sort of weekend getaway, and road trips lasting for perhaps a week or two….which brings me to the second reason we bought the XKR…

As many here know I’m passionate about high performance driving, and have spent around 20 days a year enjoying many race tracks in Canada and the US from Quebec to Virginia and Atlanta to Wisconsin. Those road courses provided the opportunity to enjoy my other high performance sports cars at the limit in as safe and legal a manner as is possible, to modify them to perform far beyond their designed abilities, and to advance my own high performance driving skills. A big part of the enjoyment was experiencing new parts of the country, as well as the tracks themselves. But after doing that for many years I wanted to step back from the extra work related to tracking highly modified street cars, and simplify things. No more hauling around extra sets of track wheels, jacks, tool boxes and gear…hopefully just a tire pressure gage and a helmet bag with driving gloves and shoes. I did that for the first time in the XKR last fall right after taking delivery of it. The XKR performed well beyond my expectations, and was particularly impressed with how well it braked, and how light and nimble it handled given its considerable weight. I’m looking forward to more seat time at the track this summer, and once I’m comfortable with it on track I’ll do some distant track events and enjoy all those great GT qualities driving there and back. I think it’s a standout among the few Grand Touring cars with this level of style, luxurious comfort and truly high performance ability.

In the meantime I’ll use the car as often as I can. I’m recently retired and doing a major renovation on a waterfront home. I drive into the local town usually twice per week, and to Toronto a couple of times a month. If I’m not hauling materials or people in the van I take the Jag. I find it as well suited to that use as it is to gobbling up miles of highway in complete comfort, and tearing down straights and around corners on the track. We chose the one we did for well-defined and travelled uses, and I’m sure this is why I feel I’ve loved this car forever.

And that’s why I say this 2010 XKR is the Trifecta of Driving Excellence!

I hope you enjoyed reading my story, and will share your own tales of epic joy.

Bruce

 

Bruce - great story well written and brought a smile to my face as I read it.

I was fortunate enough to be able to borrow one for a few hours one day some time ago and found myself recounting that and appreciating what you wrote.

You're a lucky guy Bruce and I hope you continue to enjoy your ride for some time to come.
Thanks for sharing........................

 

What a beauty. I'm jealous!

 

What a great story, Bruce!

Here's a silly question: How do you attach images to posts here, so they show in the post like yours does?

 

You have to insert them as images, not attachments. There is a button when you post that looks like a mountain with the sun in the background. Of course, that requires that your photos are already hosted somewhere on the internet.

 

Good story, Bruce. Pretty much sums up the joys of owning the Jag. However, you left out the part where you sneak out of your hotel room with every silly little excuse, just to steal an other look at the sexy lines of the beast. If your wife could read your mind, she'd be jealous of the competition!

Albert

 

Thanks guys...glad you enjoyed it. I use photbucket.com to host my photos. There's a image link code to use on forums that you just copy and paste into your post and the pic appears.

OMG...you nailed it. But I just had to look out our 2nd floor window because it was parked right there!


I didn't mention that we walked around a waterfront park and marina and spotted an '07 XKR over in the parking lot. I asked a couple sitting by the water if the Jag was theirs, which it was. They hadn't had it long and were still getting used to it. Gorgeous burgandy red colour with black soft top. It's the first XK/XKR I've seen since buying mine in October. Later when we were leaving town we saw them driving the other way and waved at each other. These cars are impossibly beautiful...and impossible to miss on the road.


Bruce

 

Bruce - just don't know what to say. Fantastic, wonderful, magnificent...

I think it would be awesome as hell if about 30 of us could plan a road trip and drive through different places as a group. An armada of XK/XKR's.

That would a sight to behold!

 

Good story , you are a lucky guy

 

RS,
That sounds like a great idea. A few years ago the Supra community pulled together a 30-40 car meet at Road Atlanta that tied in with a Panoz Track Days school and a "Show and Shine". Some guys were eager to do the school, others for just the show set up in the track's parking lot. A local Supra tuner/custom audio shop hosted a dinner at their shop on the Saturday night of the weekend event. Forum members drove great distances from everywhere to meet the others face to face, and participate in the event.

I think some guys could get pretty excited about taking their cars out on the track just for the experience of having done it, and to see how their pride and joys perform at higher performance levels than they can safely and enjoyably do on the street. There could be morning and afternoon "lead and follow" session where cars go out in a train that starts off slowly lapping the track so everyone can get familiar and comfortable with the track.

The lead car is driven by someone experienced with the track, demonstrating "the line" that cars should drive in order to enter and exit corners safely. Each car directly follows the lead car for one lap and then pulls off to the side and falls in behind the last car, allowing the next car in line to follow directly behind the lead car for a lap to get the most benefit. In-between the track would be open to everyone that wants to go out for lapping at their own pace.

This could be set-up at any one of several tracks around the country, and be sponsored by a local Jaguar dealer. It could tie into an existing organized track school event that's geared to novice and intermediate drivers, or be our own event at a smaller and less expensive track than a Road Atlanta type track.

The dealer "sponsorship" might entail a tour of their facility on the saturday night, a dinner that could be paid for by attendees and as simple as some rented banquet tables and bbq hot dogs, burgers, couple of salads, decadent deserts...! The dealer could even drop by the event with, I don't know...how about an F-Type or whatever. Not sure if there's a Jag dealer out there that would be interested in showing off their latest driver focused offerings to a bunch of enthusiasts in a casual and friendly race track setting...what do you think?

Or it could be as simple as a meet and greet with a scenic drive to follow. A Jaguar dealer might even want to join us and bring, I don't know...how about an F-Type or latest XK! Interested members could take an informal turn behind the wheel while being told all about the car...organize that and members will come!

I am very fortunate, and find 'giving back' is the most rewarding aspect of that.

Bruce

 

Gonna give this some more thought. Maybe I could get some help from other XK/XKR drivers near me...

Hmmm.