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Most people fit into some sort of mold; a neatly-defined spectrum of their main characteristics. Fast forward beyond the artists, accountants or analysts and you eventually stumble upon a very unique group called “explorers”.
Mercedes-Benz has been a pioneering brand from day one of the car and it’s not often that this German outfit is caught napping. Perhaps they were dozing slightly when sales figures of medium-sized luxury SUV’s shot skywards; led by the BMW X3 and Audi’s Q5. Mercedes’ answer, the GLC, only arrived last year.
Around the 1990’s, Mercedes-Benz jumped on the band-wagon of extending their product range. Where before the E-Class, S-Class, SL and Geländewagen were all the cars you could ever need, showrooms were suddenly cluttered with the likes of C-Class, CLK, SLK, ML and A-Class.
This review should be one of the easiest and shortest texts I have ever composed but the vehicle in question evokes such vastly differing emotions (also for yours truly) that it threatens to bloat my report into novel proportions. You see, I’ve just spent a week driving Land Rover’s Defender 110 Heritage Edition.
Mercedes-Benz is one of the most innovative automotive brands on the planet, never mind the oldest, so it’s rather surprising that they have a monster lurking in their pricelist. A rugged, uncompromising, almost backwards machine called (insert sounds of thunder) Der Geländewagen.
Prepare to meet the definition of the words legend, antique and expensive. I haven’t been so excited about a test car in months and it’s been equally long since I witnessed such diverse and lively reactions to a vehicle, in this case a Mercedes-Benz G350 BlueTEC.