Taking the Mazda3 Four-Door Grand Touring to San Angelo Texas

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The Mazda3 Four-Door Grand Touring is a sleek, sporty four-door sedan that doesn't make you feel like you're driving a four-door sedan. We took it on the road from San Antonio to West Texas. Check out our trip notes here on the blog.

I drove the Mazda3 four-door Grand Touring for a week both around town and on a road trip from San Antonio to San Angelo. The vehicle was provided for my use by Mazda. All opinions are my own.

Taking the Mazda3 to San Angelo Texas

Taking the Mazda3 Four-Door Grand Touring to San Angelo Texas — West Texas is a highly underrated travel destination. It's super charming with lots of great food and photo opps. And lots of great food…did I say that already?

San Angelo is known as “The Pearl of West Texas.” Located along the heart of the Concho River in the heart of ranching country, San Angelo is a great place to discover western frontier heritage as well as cultural attractions, food, and family friendly activities. I drove the Mazda3 four-door Grand Touring from San Antonio to San Angelo and loved the ride!

If you're visiting San Angelo, make your first stop the San Angelo Visitor's Center. There is lots of info on things to do in town and the surrounding areas but there are also some beautiful, photo-worthy spots on back along the river walk. More info here on San Angelo.

These larger than life statues at behind the Visitor's center represent Carolina Angela de la Garza DeWitt, the wife of San Angelo's founder and St Angela Merici (AKA Santa Angela.)

While the Mazda3 four-door Grand Touring isn't meant to be a family car for a medium to large-sized family, we can fit two kids in booster seats in the back, in a pinch or for a shorter trip. It makes a great car for a smaller family or a single. The Mazda3 four-door Grand Touring would also make a great second car. This car is advertised as a 5-passenger, but again, in a pinch. There's room for three in the back seat (at least there are three seat belts) but this is not meant to be the main car for a family with three kids. In the low twenties, this car might be an affordable option for a “drive to work” car for my husband but I wouldn't want it as my “all the time drive my kids around” vehicle.

Would you believe that San Angelo, Texas has the largest collection of water lilies in THE WORLD? It seems an unlikely place but Civic League Park, located just minutes from downtown San Angelo, has the largest collection of water lilies anywhere on this planet.

There are SO many different kinds of water lilies. These large lily pads can even hold a human (although not a super heavy one.) If water lilies aren't your thing, check out this list of things you can do while in town. Also, eat at the Angry Cactus. It's amazing.

More about the Mazda3 four-door Grand Touring:

Standard features include: Bi-LED headlights with auto leveling, automatic on/off headlights, LED fog lights, daytime running lights, and combination taillights, rain-sensing variable-intermittent windshield wipers, body-colored power and heated side mirrors with integrated turn signals, bright beltline trim, power sliding-glass moonroof with one-touch-open feature and interior sunshade, roof-mounted “shark fin” antenna, Black metallic front grille insert, and rear decklid spoiler. It's very sporty looking.

Standard wheel and tire features include 1.8 x 7.0 inch aluminum alloy with Dark Silver finish, P215/45 R18 all-season tires with, of course, a temporary spare.

EPA estimated fuel economy is 27 miles to the gallon and for city driving and 36 miles to the gallon for highway driving. We had an equal mix of in-town and highway driving during our week with the Mazda3 four-door Grand Touring, and I'd say that's accurate.

The Mazda3 four-door Grand Touring comes with the MAZDA CONNECT™ Infotainment System which includes multifunction commander control, Infotainment system voice command, Radio Broadcast Data System program information, Aha™ internet radio integration , HD Radio™, Pandora^® internet radio integration, Stitcher™ internet radio integration, SMS text message audio delivery and reply and E911 automatic emergency notification. There's also a 7″ full-color touch screen display with Bose^® 9 speaker surround sound system with Centerpoint^® 2 and AudioPilot^® 2 Bluetooth^®⁹ hands-free phone and audio streaming capability – all things that make you comfortable and road trip ready.

The Mazda3 four-door Grand Touring is available in Soul Red, shown here, as well as Machine Gray and Snowflake White Peal Mica, which is also really pretty. Yes, the color of the car matters to me. I love the red but if I could pick my own color, it would definitely be the Snowflake Pearl Mica.