Price £17,995
MPG 37.7
Top speed 107mph
The Royal Bath & West has its fair share of polka-dot wellies, pearl necklaces and exuberant quiffs on chubby young men wearing shirts with Liberty-print collars, but it’s also a showcase for the real countryside, a place of mud and blood. In the livestock pens, owners roll out bags and sleep next to their prize animals. The pigs are brushed lovingly like huge children, the cows are washed, the chickens stroked. Ernest, a glossy, 1.5 tonne, two-year-old Aberdeen Angus, is taken for an evening walk like a family pet. And the sheep, dozens of them, are speed-shorn. We watch, dumbstruck, as six sweating finalists compete for the Golden Shears – their target is 20 sheep in 20 minutes. “These guys are the sex gods of farming,” grins a bloke in a dirty boiler suit next to me.
The Bath & West was the perfect destination for me as I was driving a pick-up truck. If you were wondering who buys pick-ups, you haven’t been to an agricultural show in a while. They were thick on the ground. My SsangYong Korando Sports, with its gleaming metallic paint, leather seats, reversing camera, touch-screen satnav and great sound system, did stand out like a Chelsea tractor on working farm, but beneath its fashionable fripperies it’s as down and dirty as the best of them.
You might think there wasn’t much demand for a pick-up, but it’s a sector that is growing fast and with the likes of the Toyota HiLux, Nissan Navara, Mitsubishi L200 and Isuzu D-Max slugging it out at the pricier end, there’s room for a cheaper model at the bottom of the ladder. At least, that’s what this Korean maker hopes.
The Korando – a contraction of “Korea Can Do” – is a bizarre but strangely appealing amalgam of everything you might need in a car. It has a double cab which means it seats five with plenty of room, it has an enormous rear tray and folding tailgate, it has a go-anywhere low-range four-wheel drive and can handle motorway cruising without hesitation.
It will happily slot into your life whether you are a farmer, handyman, weekend camper, sports enthusiast or, in my case, parent retrieving two students and all their junk from university. It’ll tow a trailer/caravan/sailboat/horsebox as long as it weighs less than 2.7 tonnes. The only issue is parking. Not easy. Just ask the Audi driver in Bristol who took offence at me burying my tow-hook in the front of his car. Don’t mess with pick-up drivers, I snarled… Actually, I said sorry and gave him my number.
One quirk of the Korando is that it has more sophisticated rear suspension than most of its pick-up buddies – this means it drives more comfortably on the road, but its dead-lift loads are limited to 643kg. Compromise, compromise… It comes with just one engine choice – a robust and throaty 149bhp 2-litre turbodiesel, but you can have a manual or an automatic.
I tested the latter, which was smooth and responsive – a little too responsive in reverse, hence the Audi incident. The steering is astonishingly light, too. People moan about this: no road feel, they say. But who wants to feel the road? Sitting up high, controlling an adult-sized Tonka toy with nothing more than a finger on the steering wheel, is my idea of luxury.
As with all SsangYongs (which means double dragon – everything seems to mean something in Korea), it comes with a confidence-inspiring five-year/unlimited mileage warranty. The car is unashamedly cheap, and some of the switchgear does feel basic, but dwelling on that misses the point. This pick-up is terrific value for money. And you don’t have to get it muddy.
Voyage of Discovery
This week sees the launch of the all-new Land Rover Discovery Sport. Bold, progressive and set to be one of the world’s most versatile and capable premium compact SUV. It will also feature 5+2 seating in a footprint no larger than existing 5-seat premium SUVs. UK pricing to start from under £30,000 for eD4 variant later in 2015 and £32,395 (SD4) from January 2015. To help launch this new “out of this world” vehicle, Land Rover is also running a competition to send four winners into space with Virgin Galactic. Have a look at this site to win a truly once-in-a-lifetime experience landrover.com/gotospace.
Email Martin at martin.love@observer.co.uk or follow him on Twitter @MartinLove166
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