Unusual love among the heather . .

Press, 24 December 1986, Page 21

Unusual love among the heather . .

JOAN BURNIE, a DUO writer, lost her heart among the heather on a cold and desolate Scottish moor, to a dark, handsome, beautifully equipped new Jaguar XJ6.

I have always believed love at first sight was something better left to teenagers and Barbara Cartland. It was not an emotion in which grownup ladies indulged. Or so I told myself, until the day I lost my heart on a cold and desolate Scottish moor among heather as purple as any romantic novelist’s prose. Large, handsome, dark, beautifully turned out — how could I stop myself?

Not that looks alone did it — oh no, there was also the gentle manner, the strength, the power behind the elegant exterior. With all that and even more to discover as we became better acquainted, how could anyone help falling in love with the new Jaguar XJ6? I may not understand the niceties of an engine

which can get you to 60 m.p.h. (97 km/h) in around eight seconds and which, if you have no care for your driving licence, will cruise the motorways at speeds in excess of 130 m.p.h. (209 km/h), but I do enjoy a car which gets you where you want to go fast. Although the man from Jaguar was practically poetic on the pleasures of the yaw control — I lost him somewhere among diagrams about the relative speeds of the right and left hand sides of the car — it was the illuminated door key which sold the thing to me.

I mean, how many times have you struggled in the dark of some sububan shopping centre car park, grappling with seven plastic carriers stuffed with the week’s domestic necessities, and had to abandon the lot while you searched, fruitlessly, for the boot lock? And when you do eventually find it, one broken bottle of ketchup later, you invariably discover that the shopping will not all fit in, and the Camembert has to go in the back seat to drip all over the upholstery and the dry cleaning. The boot in the XJ6 is

some 15 cubic feet. If I had been careless enough to run over any sheep on my Scottish idyll, I could have disposed of the evidence without difficulty — and still left room for some venison.

Then there is the central locking system which will automatically and electroniclly shut all open windows as the car is locked. My only niggle — what happens if the toddler has his little fingers in there, too? Or a mother-in-law’s head? I am sure that Jaguar does not want its car used as an instant guillotine however unintentionally it happens. That apart it is a wholly magnificent vehicle. Inside is lots of leg room and plenty of space — all that leather, wood and chrome can make you believe, if only for a minute, that you are not in a car at ail but have strayed, in some “Alice in Wonderland” way, into a gentleman’s club.

It is wonderfully luxurious and comfortable. The nearest I have yet been to going back to the womb, I thought, as I electronically adjusted the seats to cocoon me in splendour. My test car did not have the heated front seats which are an optional extra, but it did have almost everything else — except a place to hang a handbag. “Really,” said my minder from Jaguar, “we can’t have things swinging about — it would be a hazard . . .” Maybe, but it would be nice if there could be some place within easy reach, which would hold a woman’s handbag.

After all, although few women in Britain will buy the car for themselves, 47 per cent of all customers in America (the company’s largest market) are female. To them apparently it is a small car, a mere 16ft (4.877 m long and 6ft (1.829 m wide, easy to park and to

manoeuvre in tight spaces. Even on the narrow moorland roads I did not feel as if I was driving a tank or even a tractor. The XJ6 is above all obedient: a touch of the wheel, a slight pressure on the brake and the command is instantly carried out. It has, of course, full power steering which means that you can back into a meter bay (if you can find one) without your arms ending up in traction. But it is on motorways that the full delights of the car are revealed, as it effortlessly guzzles the miles. What about petrol? About 20 miles (32.187 km to the gallon (4.546 litres) is probably the most which can be hoped for, although at £16,500 ($49,500) and up for a car, the cost of the petrol is probably the least of the worries.

The largest worry probably is understanding all the digital readouts and

messages which confront the driver the minute the ignition is switched on. This, I was given to believe, was a mere female quibble — apparently men like having a display of Concorde proportions in front of them. Makes them feel like Biggies or something. And, of course, how else can Jaguar show off the seven microprocessors which control all the car’s essential functions? Perish the thought and hush my mouth, should your electronic wonder-waggon break down; there is absolutely no point in opening

the bonnet and fiddling with the engine. That is for a specially-trained mechanic to drive in and sort out. Thank God. But those microprocessors have their uses. One controls not only the air conditioning (standard in the Sovereign and Daimler models, optional in the XJ6) but also the humidity levels. In theory the household plants would thrive very nicely in a Jaguar, but one result of the added moisture is that contact lenses do not crack or cause discomfort as they so often do in dry air.

Everything in the car is, they tell me, totally new. But for all that the car is instantly recognised, and admired, as a Jaguar.

No-one ever asked me its make. But then, Jaguar is not stupid. In an age of cars which increasingly look alike, to have a shape instantly recognised is a good and a very ellable th: -

sellable . .ing. From the rear it does have slight echoes of a Bentley. Jaguar assures me that this is not in any way intentional: “We do not need to pretend to be something else. Being Jaguar is enough.” Indeed it is. And almost all British, too. Well, at least, I didn’t fall for any foreigner. — DUO Copyright.