…but also a great car is the Octavia, a great car built by Skoda.
It plays in the same league as the VW Bora/Jetta, VW Passat, Audi A4, BMW 3 series, Toyota Avensis, Peugeot 407, and many more.
What is so special about the Octavia is that it offers the most value for your (and my ;-)) money. You hardly miss anything compared against the Passat (I can tell because I drove most of the above mentioned cars myself, at least I studied the brochures,) but you pay 3,200 EUR less for the Octavia than for the Passat.
So why am I telling you this? I will probably buy myself a new car some time late in 2005, and if not something very strange happens, it will be an Octavia Elegance with the 105 HP diesel engine. The thing that is still keeping me from buying it now is that you can’t yet order it with a diesel particle filter. Considering that a diesel car without a particle filter is not exactly something I would call “environmentally friendly,” I don’t even think about getting myself one without a filter.