KIA SORENTO 2.5 CRDi XE 5dr (2003)

Always liked Kias, Sorento hasn't let me down... yet!

About twenty years ago I had a Fiat that was almost my financial ruin, it needed so many repairs, stupid thing. After that I got a tip off from a friend about east Asian cars being a lot more reliable, and making smarter use of space etc., so I shopped around and got a Daihatsu. I haven't looked back since. I've had a Toyota and a Honda as well, and now the Kia Sorento continues my run of good solid cars from that part of the world.

My main reason for getting the Kia Sorento was to lug a caravan that my partner and I have got now that we're mostly holidaying alone these days. Our little Honda would never had handled it, so we traded in. The Sorento handles the caravan very ably, never seems to struggle even on quite steep hills. The 4x4 is well designed, and when the caravan is off I've taken it over some pretty rough conditions before and it eats them up very competently.

The only major downside is that the Kia Sorento is ever so slightly a little bit of a bone shaker over longer journeys. We find ourselves getting out every couple of hundred miles when we're going camping, to stretch the old legs and get the circulation going again. I suppose comfort could be better. Having said that, the driving position is fantastic, great view over all the other traffic.

The other good thing for camping is that it's got a nice big boot. We try not to keep too much stuff in the caravan itself as we travel, and the boot actually takes almost all of our clothing, food, water and camping gear, with the bikes on the roof and a few basics on the back seats. It's nice and high up too, so no need to be bending our ageing backs down into the boot. Also good for long journeys is the nice big storage box in between the two front seats, we can easily just chuck all our valuables in there when we stop for a wee, or go out walking for the day (we don't tend to leave valuables in the caravan, it's only got a little lock).

As for repairs so far, very little. After a few months it had some electrical fault with the stereo, but the dealer fixed that within the warranty they provided (we'd bought second hand). I don't foresee any problems arising, but one can never tell. Fingers crossed eh?