Our little Peugeot runabout

This is the Peugeot that I wrote about a couple of days ago, when its interior rear-view mirror became detachedom the windshield. It's a Peugeot 206 that was first registered and put on the road in December of the year 2000. In August 2003, I bought it from a Peugeot dealership (the Garage Danger, named after Monsieur Danger, the owner), which went out of business several years ago. I really wanted to buy a new car, preferably a Citroën, but when I went and talked to the Citroën dealer here in July 2003, he said summer vacation had started and the Citroën factory would be closed down for a couple of months. Then he'd have to order a new car for me, and I probably wouldn't be able to take possession of it before mid-October.

That was too long for us to wait. We were renting a car that didn't have air-conditioning in it — long story — and the summmer of 2003 had been really hot since our arrival in France in early June. C'était la Grande Canicule, with many days when the high temperature was between 95 and 105 degrees Fahrenheit and the early morning lows were in the mid-70s. We weren't used to such weather, after having lived in chilly San Francisco for more than 15 years. We didn't have AC in our house here, but we really wanted have it in our car.

One day back then 9I was driving past the Danger garage and saw this Peugeot out front with an à vendre sign on it. It was kind of expensive, and I really wanted a Citroën, but the Peugeot had a lot of options, including air-conditioning as well as a rain sensor built into the windshield that activated the windshield wipers when needed. It had a relatively big diesel engine (two liters) and was a comfortable four-door hatchback.

I bought the car, telling Walt that if we turned out not to like it, I would just sell it or trade it in and get a different car. We got the Peugeot in early August, 21 years ago, and we are still driving it. It has needed a few repairs and replacements over the years (timing belt, fuel pump, clutch, speedometer, batteries, brakes, etc. — but what car doesn't? Today it has about 200,000 kilometers au compteur — that's 120,000 miles. It's one of the the best cars I've ever owned.