Whatshot
Driving the Touareg
Driving the Touareg
Date: 2018-10-05
This car has a real presence, it commands a stately magnetism that immediately had me reaching out for the door handle with a shortness of breath. I felt childish in my enthusiasm and was bordering on bewilderment when I opened the door and slipped onto the spacious driver's seat.
Volkswagen have coined a new phrase with their "Innovision Cockpit", a fully digitised environment that interfaces through a 12 or 15 inch touch screen, almost completely devoid of buttons and knobs. And what made it even more attractive was the fact that it all worked seamlessly, the smartphone connection happened almost instantly and everything was at my fingertips in a flash.
I was driving the third generation Toaureg, the most technologically advanced Volkswagen ever produced to date. It was equipped with driver assistance programs, mind bending safety features, the car will even steer itself to some extent, a feature I resisted the urge to test too far.
This is a big SUV, yet when driving it I never felt hindered by its size, quite to the contrary, it hopped like a marsh hare and sprinted like a cheetah. The acceleration was awesome and the handling, with four wheel steering, was granted all the respect I could ever muster for an SUV.
The 3.0 TDI V6 engine, also used in the Porsche Cayenne, puts out 190 kilowatts of power and an awe inspiring 600 Newton meters of torque. Sensational is just one of the words that come to mind.
Looking past the long list of driver assistance like "Trailer Assist" and "Lane Assist" with a thermal camera for night vision assistance, to spot animals and people in the dark, the Toaureg seemed like it was made for me, personally. It felt like a hand in a glove and I was traumatised when they came to take it away.
If test-drive only one car this year, make it the new Touareg from McCarthy Volkswagen Durban. Call them on 031 - 367 6767 and be ready to be blown away.