Living with the Passat, part 2
No more Monday blues
I hate Monday mornings. More than the return to routine that the start of the week entails, it’s the ubiquity that Mondays bring back, that especially haunt me. The ubiquity of the working week, driving to and from work and being stuck in endless traffic jams can be exhausting and, frankly, gloomy. You feel like one among the crowd of bored-out-of-their-minds office goers. One fine Monday however, the Volkswagen Passat came forward to rescue miserable me.
Much to my dismay an early start with the Passat was planned and I left the comforts of my house at 7am. Immediately obvious was the fact that that the Passat is dressed to impress. The straight lines all over the Passat help accentuate its well-balanced proportions. The shade of metallic blue that the one I was driving around came in elevated it to another level. Although a rather simple design, the VW holds its own and is quite handsome to look at with its LED headlamps and tail lamps easily recognisable even at a distance. The Passat has the classic charm of a gentleman in a well-tailored suit and that is something that never gets old.
A couple of more moments spent ogling the car from close quarters and then I was ready to jump in but wait, I had some camera equipment to put in the boot. I walked over to the back, just raised and moved my foot under the tail of the Passat and voila, the cavernous boot of the Passat was at my disposal. Gaurav would be happy.
A class above
Bathed in swathes of leather, metal and wood, the Passat feels a class above every other premium sedan around. I settled into the supremely comfortable 14-way electrically adjustable seat and rather curiously found a row of buttons right next to the seat on my right. This was a massage seat! The stiff back from all of the doing nothing on the weekend was soon going to be a worry of the past. Selecting reverse on the DSG, I moved out of the tight parking spot aided in no small measure by the 360-degree surround view and the high-res parking camera. A light prod of the accelerator later, I am on my way to Hinjewadi cutting through maddening city traffic. Something felt different though. The ease with which I could pilot the Passat around in traffic just didn’t stop impressing me. Visibility is great too and the car was easy to drive with some very good brakes to help you get out of a tight situation unscathed.
After trundling around in the rush hour traffic for a bit, Gaurav said it was time to park. I obliged and thought maybe it’s the right time to test out the Passat’s Pilot Assist. The steering wheel spun on its own, the accelerator was depressed and in a few seconds we were perfectly parked. It’s things like these that make the Passat the perfect companion for a gloomy Monday.
With the Passat, you are always in the groove
On the move, the brilliant audio system and the great infotainment console only served to make things easier. Apple CarPlay was connected, my favourite playlist was playing and the navigation showed us the shortest route to Hinjewadi. Over the next half an hour of driving through the city and avoiding errant auto rickshaws, the Passat ably demonstrated something it had in hooves. Something I would like to call the joy of driving. No, it wasn’t the Passat’s dynamic ability, which is something it has in spades too. It was about how I could be cocooned in absolute comfort and drive through annoying morning traffic to reach office fresh as a daisy. The Passat has that and it brings a smile to your face every single time. This car was just too comfortable for me to just drive to office. I had to take it out of the city. And so I did. I drove to the outskirts of the city and just like that sunrays streaked brilliantly through the curtain of clouds. The sunroof was opened and I took in all of that Vitamin E. Office could wait.
