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Pasadena to Palos Verdes in Luxury

On a weekend getaway the Volkswagen CC delivered power, comfort and lots of style

By CANDICE MERRILL
Published: Thursday, November 12, 2009 | 5:41 PM

It was 4:30 p.m. on a Friday afternoon and we were finally ready to head out to the Palos Verdes Peninsula for a much-needed weekend getaway. We loaded our luggage into the spacious trunk of the 2009 Volkswagen CC we were test driving that weekend and prepared to hit the road.

The VW CC was created by taking the rather practical Passat with ho-hum styling and transforming it into a bombshell. The front-end styling was made sleeker, and the rear end was tapered down from the radically sloped roof line. The finished product was remarkably sexier than the original which you can’t say about most midsized sedans.

We programmed our destination into the in-dash navigation system, received our first instructions and headed out to the 110 freeway and then we crawled. 4:30 p.m. is not a good time to try driving through downtown but add Friday to the mix and you’ve got a traffic nightmare. That gave me all the more time to become acquainted with my new toy.

Black leather seats cradled me as I listened to the satellite radio and tried to remain calm. A sunroof opened to allow fresh air (relatively) and a gentle voice told me to “bear to the left”

We finally hit the carpool lane and I was able to “let her rip”. A four cylinder 200 horsepower engine had me to 65 mph in no time and we cruised to the end of the freeway in San Pedro. The turbo-charged engine kicked in as we climbed the steep hills to 25th Street and the suspension kept our drive comfortable as we navigated the rugged road at Portuguese Bend (an area of constant land movement).

We pulled up to the resort and I was proud to hand over the keys to the valet. The Volkswagen CC is stylish and well appointed. I could see the valet trying to figure out what type of car it was: “a Lexus or a Mercedes or maybe a BMW?” It has that “wow! What is that car?” factor.

Ours was silver with a black interior; very sleek. And it doesn’t skimp on the backseat; two supportive buckets separated by a console and plenty of leg room. This means that the car can only seat four but I think the comfort gained is more than worth the sacrifice of one seat. The only problem I had with the interior was the front seats; they flared out at the edges and if you happened to land on the edge of the seat while getting in (and I did several times) it made for an uncomfortable surprise.

As for safety, the CC comes standard with antilock disc brakes with brake assist, stability and traction control, front-seat side airbags and side curtain airbags. Rear-seat side airbags are optional on all trim levels.

The Luxury model’s base price comes in at just over $32,000, with the upgraded navigation system and sound system it retails for $36,000. Gas mileage estimates are 19 MPG city and 29 MPG highway. I’d estimate the gas mileage on our trip to be around 26 MPG, pretty good for a car with the CC’s get up and go!

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