Cooper S, mk5 Golf GTI or A3 2.0T?

[white_goodman]

I turn 35 this month and am thinking about treating myself to a new (to me) car to replace my worthy but dull and ancient Chrysler. Practicalities and two young children dictate that it must have 4 seats and a decent-sized boot and preferably 4 doors (but not necessarily). I live in a snowy/icy climate too (rural Manitoba, Canada), so I think AWD (or FWD) is probably better suited to the roads I have to drive on than RWD. I am also very keen to get back to a manual transmission! Now, I could probably afford the payments (I will need some financing) on a new vanilla-spec Focus but my wife and I test drove most of the small new cars last year before settling on a new Toyota Corolla and they were all as dull as ditchwater to drive (including the Toyota).

I have tried to find something in my price range with a manual transmission (which is a challenge in itself) and a little bit different to the generic Japanese/Korean/American cars that most people drive here. What should I go for?

Audi A3 2.0T Sportback?

http://www.autotrader.ca/a/Audi/A3/Brandon/Manitob...

Nice spec and low kms but I wish it was a quattro! Quite a rare car here, so not the slightly nobbish image that they have in the UK (also I've never owned an Audi).

mk5 Golf GTI?

http://www.autotrader.ca/a/Volkswagen/GTI/Winnipeg...

Again, very nice spec but higher kms than the Audi (although 100,000km isn't that much for an 8 year old car). Wish it was a 5 door though. Are the engines (2.0TFSI) in these problematic or was that the later ones?

MINI Cooper S?

http://www.autotrader.ca/a/MINI/Cooper/Winnipeg/Ma...

These look like quite good fun and this is probably about the least girly spec you can get but not very practical and not sure if they are as reliable as BMW would like us to think?

Any thoughts on either of these options would be gratefully received.

Edited by white_goodman on Sunday 11th January 22:57