All the ‘issues’ that you might have living in the real world with the Aston Martin Vanquish Volante would disappear if you could afford the £200,000 required to buy it in the first place.

Zero leg room in the back seats? You’d probably own a Range Rover as a second car. Worried about cleaning those white leather seats? Surely you just get somebody in to clean them? Slightly concerned by 18.1mpg? Here’s my Coutts credit card…

Driving an Aston Martin around for a week is not living in the real world for the majority of us. I’ve driven faster and more expensive cars but the Vanquish just has a little something that is best described as the X factor. You can’t put your finger on it but it makes all the difference.

For me, it’s the ‘made in Britain’ tag, the rasping exhaust pipes that provide the perfect soundtrack to every drive and the breathtaking interior. Even though I would never pick white leather…