It's been a good car, but it was time to move on.
We traded in the 2003 Mazda Protege 5 yesterday for a 2011 Mitsubishi Outlander Sport. It was with some hesitance that we let this car go, as it has been a good car and a very fun car to drive. In fact, in some ways it is better than its brand-new replacement. It's certainly faster, as it has been thee fastest four-cylinder car we have ever owned.
But we have found on more than one occasion that if we're going to continue living in the North (and circumstances currently dictate that we will for some time), then we really should have something with four-wheel-drive. And the only way we could buy another vehicle was to let one we currently own go. The Mazda drew the short straw, mainly because our other daily driver, the Celica, gets about 25 percent better gas mileage and has more comfortable seats for long distance driving.
We turned down one dealer's trade-in offer on the Mazda because we felt it made the Mazda the better value in comparison to the price of the Nissan we were looking at. But a few days later we went to a different dealer to look at the Mitsubishi and they showed much more desire to acquire ole "Yeller." Apparently they saw at least some of what we could see in this Mazda.
And so, the Mazda now wears the "No Longer Owned" tag on Motortopia. But the photos are still there, as will be our memories of this fine car.

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