Thanks to a well-placed friend :-), I was able to sit in and gently caress a couple of 2003 SL500's while I was in Florence last week. The car is awesome in person, though it seems much smaller than the outgoing model. When you are approaching the car from the front, you first can easily mistake it for the CL, but then on closer look, you notice the headlamps are different. What is interesting is the tail lamps are exactly the same as one of the "studies" they did for the tail lamps on the S-Class. The ONLY complaint I have for the interior is the cheap looking plastic instrument binnacle cover. The dash is leather, but for some reason they chose to use this cheap looking plastic for the intrument cover. But after this experience, I am seriously considering trading my CL for the new SL. I just need to find out how long the waiting list is.

If anyone is interested, I can scan the pics I took next week when I return to the office. You will have to ignore the sorry looking chap (me) though.