Cross Aventura Overview

[gbryal]

The Cross Aventura is one of the pens on the lower end of the price spectrum for Cross, and is available in office stores such as OfficeMax in the United States.

It's available in multiple colors, but the one I am reviewing is blue plastic with chrome. It doesn't have much in common with other Cross pens that I have used, though the nib appears to be the same one used on the slightly-higher priced Bailey pen.

Capped and inked with converter I measure 21g.Uncapped, 12g. It is about 156mm posted, 134mm unposted, 146mm capped.

The plastic is fingerprint-prone and also easily shows microscratches, making it somewhat unsightly in daylight with much use. The section is slightly bellied, and the chrome is very slick if your fingers are at all oily, making it difficult to grip. I have found also that the section is not tightly bound to the feed/nib assembly, so that they are able to turn freely inside.

The barrel has a lipstick-shaped end that joins the barrel with a chrome ring. This also is able to turn freely.

A theme of the pen's design is a slant. The cap slants at the bottom (so that it would lean and fall over if you set it on the open end.) This slant is shallower than the angle of the lipstick-like end.

The chrome ring on the cap says Cross on it. This branding is also on the clip, which has a slit down the center. Cross is also written in the same all-caps typeface on the nib itself.

The nib seems slightly small for the pen. It's stamped with ladder of semicircles that run down the nib within a sort of "U" shape. The nib's width is written on the side. In the office supply stores, I haven't seen any other nib besides the M.

It writes a smooth medium-broad line, and performs well on any paper I've thrown at it, without much bleeding even on fairly porous papers.

It's possible to post this pen, but not securely. It's likely the cap will rapidly work its way off of the pen.

The clip is springy and functional, and doesn't seem prone to breaking. It's attached firmly and doesn't travel around the cap.

The pen accepts an unthreaded Cross converter, available on Amazon.

The packaging includes a small white gift box, which isn't fancy, but is nice and something to open when being presented with the pen.

The pen writes well enough, is large enough in my largish hands to be comfortable enough unposted, and the section is not too small for me. The blue color, the scratch-prone plastic, and the slippery section ensure this pen is only brought out when I forget about how little I adore those features. As it comes without a converter, the price is too dear for this pen when better alternatives are available. I'm not sure what I would recommend as a comparable pen, perhaps the Lamy Safari, which has a nicer plastic and less slippery section, or perhaps the Lamy Nexx if the tripod section on the Safari is a problem for your writing style.

AventuraCapped.jpgAventuraCapped2.jpgAventuraNib.jpgAventuraUncapped.jpg