[Waffle]

… black.

After two weeks and 2700 miles in the south of France the colour count was (approx) :

Black : 11
White : 3
Sparkling Bronze : 2
Titanium Silver : 1
Mineral Silver: 2
Space Grey: 3 (one was on the same Eurotunnel crossing as me)
Vermillion Red: 1 (at customs on the way home and the first 3.0d I’ve seen)

The south of France is SUV land. Can’t believe how many Porsche Cayennes were on the road and Panameras, Bentleys, Ferraris and it will be years before I see as many X6s.

Driving that distance in the X3 was plain sailing. The car purred down the motorways and yet handled the twisty mountain roads with ease. Many people have commented on ride quality on this site but for UK members it’s the roads in England that make all the difference, they are incomparable with France. In France even the minor roads are smooth and when they aren’t the French apologise for the poor quality. As soon as you land back on the M20 motorway you realize how poor our road surfaces are.

The SatNav never let us down and was a great help escaping the motorways for cheap fuel. Mind you I didn’t need as much of that as expected despite being fully loaded. Outward and return journeys of 850 miles averaged 40 mpg with average speeds over 70 mph.

If counting X3s doesn’t ease the boredom of the motorways I can recommend hooking up the kids iPad to the auxiliary input to get great surround sound for films. It can be a little off putting when you hear sirens but it makes you see films in a whole new light.

With the holidays over the X3 was in desperate need of a good clean inside and out. The seats cleaned up easily but the sand … it gets everywhere.

One last thing. Those who remember me posting problems with condensation in the nearside front headlamp, it’s reoccurred twice, on both occasions after a heavy downpour. Allow two weeks to dry out or a 10 hour drive. Can’t be bothered going back to BMW before the first service.