13 Jun 06
Now, not that I'm in the market, but I'd always believed that the best way for portly, ageing single chaps to attract members of the opposite sex was to get yourself a puppy and spend as much time as possible being towed round the local park, in the vain hope that just a hint of cute might rub off.
However, if the shoal of yummy mummies I regularly encounter on my-turn-for-the-school-run mornings is anything to go by, then the acquisition of a RAV4 seems to work just as well.
They just love it. I'm not sure whether it's the looks, the 4x4 part-time-mountaineer credentials, or simply the colour (a perfect match for a Harris paintbrush handle, so perhaps marking me as someone pretty useful about the house), but they bill and coo over the Toyota as if it were a toddler just taking its first steps.
On a more pragmatic level, we have both now finally mastered the clutch biting point and would quietly confess to rather enjoying the driving experience. The controls are easy and accurate throughout and, while the power-assisted steering is hilariously light at parking speeds, it does weight up just enough at speed to imbue proceedings with a little feel. My wife still mutters about body roll and 'stodgy handling' compared to the late, lamented Honda FR-V, but, in truth, I find the RAV4 remarkably tenacious through the bends and surprisingly easy to place accurately on the road.
