The Nissan Juke...The Car which is the very definition of Disciplined Insanty
Now a few months ago I travelled to Austria for the long easter weekend to visit some friends. This required me to rent a car to drive out to where they had rented a house. A good two hour drive out side of Vienna, having just spent a few days of Holiday in the South of France for some April sun as one does. I looked at the weather forecast...Snow and heavy Blizzards and decided to choose an SUV, the Nissan Juke seemed a decent bet and was a good price.
Having of course seen the advert (commercial for our American cousins) on television and other media for the car. Not going to lie I thought it was rather MAD...and not the prettiest car but I thought why not, and I am very happy I did, you will find out why now...lets begin.
The Looks
Now when you look at this car more closely it does something to the little kid inside of you...the looks and general external design are MAD, no thought whatsoever has been paid to aerodynamics. This is actually a good thing, it looks like something you would design out of Playdoh as a child. You can't help but laugh as you approach it with a childish giddy smile on your face, just enjoying the complete and utter ridiculousness of it all.
The head lights and tail lights jut out of the body work at funny and rather extreme angles. Not too dissimilar from a sculpture by the father of Cubism, yes this is the car that Pablo Picasso would have designed. This will give you the idea to the madness of the design of the body work. Its not pretty but what it lacks in beauty in makes up for in bucket loads of character. Almost like someone you meet at a party who isn't the best looking person in the world...in fact normally if you didn't feel compelled to speak to them out of politeness. You would normally avoid them all together, but its their extreme character that makes you want to enjoy their company... much like a friend of mine. This is the Nissan Juke the slightly odd looking person at a party but someone to whom you gravitate towards.
The Interior
The interior thankfully is slightly more conservative and its a rather pleasant place to be, that is of course unless you attempt to sit in the back seats...these are rather pointless and only have one reason. That would be as a place to put your shopping or your luggage. Now I know that this is an Asian car manufacturer and its a given that they are some what shorter over there. Yet still the back seats have little to no leg room whatsoever that is unless you are a double leg amputee.
I would admit that I am not what you might call average height, I am at 6ft 6 inches (200 cm to the rest of the world) taller than Mr Jeremy Clarkson. So I am not the shortest person in the world, however in this day and age the average height is actually increasing.
Meaning that when you have two people of average hight say 175 cm (Look it up if you don't know how tall that is people from USA and UK), sitting in the front even then there won't be space in the rear. These back seats are only good for one thing namely getting your rocks off on as far as I can tell.
Moving on from the back seats, there is a very ample sized boot in which you can fit most things in: luggage, shopping, a midget or two and even a large bag full of chocolate easter eggs.
The driving position for me definitely the most important place in the car, its been rather well laid out. Its here that I am subtly reminded that this is the same company that made the GTR and the Skyline. Two cars that to the pure boy racer or just general petrol head need no introduction, to those who don't know a thing about cars....they go very quickly in a straight line and go around corners like nothing else. With the styling of the steering wheel bits of red stitching and somewhat "young" and reckless vibe going on.
The GPS and multimedia touch screen work very well too, very well indeed and the USB port was found easily, so that I could plug in my Smartphone and have Sting tell me how he's thinking of a brand new day come out of the speakers. It even had a nice rear camera so that I could see where I was reversing and not to hit the kid on the bike behind me.
Now so far so good, whats even better is that this is not a diesel but a petrol and a good one, that means noise and noise is good. But enough about the look and the interior time to get down to the main course yes the driving experience.
The Driving Experience
As I mentioned in my last review of the Peugeot 308, the driving experience of any car is with out a doubt the most important aspect of a car.
It's similar to going to watch a movie at the Cinema, that has been listed as having a great cast and an equally good director. So from the outside you are looking forward to sitting in a comfortable chair and knocking back an oversized bucket of popcorn and a giant soft drink, whilst watching what you are hoping is a movie of such proportions that you actually enjoy your self. That and the fact you got there really early to get the best seat possible.
But if it turns out that the movie is well...to Shit and Beyond...and not only are you left thinking...well thats 3 hrs of my life I am never getting back again...but that you're going to have send not just your clothes to the dry cleaners. But your entire body well, as there was no escaping the arm sweat from the two oversized, obese behemoths that were sitting next to you and who between them must have brought everything that the snack shop had to offer. In the madness of their feasting half of their troff happens to end up on your lap.
Now moving on to the experience of driving the car, getting into the driving seat and starting it up, I was greeted by a surprise. There was this small screen underneath the radio which I at first thought was just a bit of nonsense. However it turned to be anything but this little scree with a few buttons. Gives the driver access to the different driving modes: Eco, Normal and POWER....all have a different bar which goes up or down depending on the strength of your right foot on the gas pedal. All with their own colours....as this was a rental once I discovered what it was it was left in POWER. This was because I loved seeing the word "Torque" in large words and it has a lovely red colour to it. The only bad thing about this and why its in the wrong place this is simply because you tend to want to continually look at it and see how much "Torque" your right foot is producing.
So after leaving the airport, the weather spat me out in to a goddamn Blizzard...in a car I had never driven before....talk about baptisms of fire. Not being sure if this car was 4WD / All Wheel Drive what ever you want to call it. But I have to say even on the snow this car didn't put a foot wrong, this is where I was reminded this cars amazing heritage. At times I was drifting around bends not on purpose I might add, and will advice to always be careful when driving on snow. Drifting is fun but also very dangerous...especially when you're not expecting todo it and I wasn't. Still I was having an utter blast driving this ugly duckling of a car. On the highway this car handles great in Eco mode very smooth and reliable. However shove this ugly mug in to Sport mode (Power) and leave it there is my recommendation, and go for a rip around country roads and dirt roads.
But this car is as much an SUV as it is a hatchback and getting on to windy roads was a BLAST....very few cars have made me feel so alive whilst driving. Nor have been so memorable this car in driving experiences if you ask me is RIGHT UP THERE and I mean it. Getting on to the dirt roads close to my friends place was so much fun, I can say take this car off the tarmac and its very close to the old Land Rover Freelander.
I would admit that I am not what you might call average height, I am at 6ft 6 inches (200 cm to the rest of the world) taller than Mr Jeremy Clarkson. So I am not the shortest person in the world, however in this day and age the average height is actually increasing.
Meaning that when you have two people of average hight say 175 cm (Look it up if you don't know how tall that is people from USA and UK), sitting in the front even then there won't be space in the rear. These back seats are only good for one thing namely getting your rocks off on as far as I can tell.
Moving on from the back seats, there is a very ample sized boot in which you can fit most things in: luggage, shopping, a midget or two and even a large bag full of chocolate easter eggs.
The driving position for me definitely the most important place in the car, its been rather well laid out. Its here that I am subtly reminded that this is the same company that made the GTR and the Skyline. Two cars that to the pure boy racer or just general petrol head need no introduction, to those who don't know a thing about cars....they go very quickly in a straight line and go around corners like nothing else. With the styling of the steering wheel bits of red stitching and somewhat "young" and reckless vibe going on.
The GPS and multimedia touch screen work very well too, very well indeed and the USB port was found easily, so that I could plug in my Smartphone and have Sting tell me how he's thinking of a brand new day come out of the speakers. It even had a nice rear camera so that I could see where I was reversing and not to hit the kid on the bike behind me.
Now so far so good, whats even better is that this is not a diesel but a petrol and a good one, that means noise and noise is good. But enough about the look and the interior time to get down to the main course yes the driving experience.
The Driving Experience
As I mentioned in my last review of the Peugeot 308, the driving experience of any car is with out a doubt the most important aspect of a car.
It's similar to going to watch a movie at the Cinema, that has been listed as having a great cast and an equally good director. So from the outside you are looking forward to sitting in a comfortable chair and knocking back an oversized bucket of popcorn and a giant soft drink, whilst watching what you are hoping is a movie of such proportions that you actually enjoy your self. That and the fact you got there really early to get the best seat possible.
But if it turns out that the movie is well...to Shit and Beyond...and not only are you left thinking...well thats 3 hrs of my life I am never getting back again...but that you're going to have send not just your clothes to the dry cleaners. But your entire body well, as there was no escaping the arm sweat from the two oversized, obese behemoths that were sitting next to you and who between them must have brought everything that the snack shop had to offer. In the madness of their feasting half of their troff happens to end up on your lap.
Now moving on to the experience of driving the car, getting into the driving seat and starting it up, I was greeted by a surprise. There was this small screen underneath the radio which I at first thought was just a bit of nonsense. However it turned to be anything but this little scree with a few buttons. Gives the driver access to the different driving modes: Eco, Normal and POWER....all have a different bar which goes up or down depending on the strength of your right foot on the gas pedal. All with their own colours....as this was a rental once I discovered what it was it was left in POWER. This was because I loved seeing the word "Torque" in large words and it has a lovely red colour to it. The only bad thing about this and why its in the wrong place this is simply because you tend to want to continually look at it and see how much "Torque" your right foot is producing.
So after leaving the airport, the weather spat me out in to a goddamn Blizzard...in a car I had never driven before....talk about baptisms of fire. Not being sure if this car was 4WD / All Wheel Drive what ever you want to call it. But I have to say even on the snow this car didn't put a foot wrong, this is where I was reminded this cars amazing heritage. At times I was drifting around bends not on purpose I might add, and will advice to always be careful when driving on snow. Drifting is fun but also very dangerous...especially when you're not expecting todo it and I wasn't. Still I was having an utter blast driving this ugly duckling of a car. On the highway this car handles great in Eco mode very smooth and reliable. However shove this ugly mug in to Sport mode (Power) and leave it there is my recommendation, and go for a rip around country roads and dirt roads.
But this car is as much an SUV as it is a hatchback and getting on to windy roads was a BLAST....very few cars have made me feel so alive whilst driving. Nor have been so memorable this car in driving experiences if you ask me is RIGHT UP THERE and I mean it. Getting on to the dirt roads close to my friends place was so much fun, I can say take this car off the tarmac and its very close to the old Land Rover Freelander.
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