Have you and your family planned any short break or week-long holiday for 2024? I know that people who want to be guaranteed a sun holiday will travel abroad as we cannot really trust the Irish weather, but it’s still a gorgeous country and there must be some county you haven’t visited.
We live on a fairly small island that now has a decent road network, so I think it’s best to travel by car whether you are going camping, to a bed and breakfast or hotel. One of the joys of staying in Ireland is exploring towns and villages you may only have heard about on traffic reports on the radio in the morning.
I cannot think of a better car for a large family to travel in than the Ford Tourneo which can accommodate eight people and had oodles of space in the boot to carry enough supplies for a week. For an Irish holiday you will need plenty of change of clothing and footwear.
The Tourneo would be ideal for a couple with small children as they can sit opposite one another in the two middles seats. Those seats will accommodate six children or indeed six adults, if it’s more of an adventure holiday you have in mind.
Wouldn’t it be nice to have a little quiz as you travel along, rather than watch the occupants ‘glued’ to their mobile phones on the journey. Indeed if you cannot find a reasonable accommodation I think the children wouldn’t mind sleeping in the car for the first night, it’s such a spacious vehicle.
The Tourneo is basically a posh Transit van which is best suited to carrying people and luggage, rather than tools for a builder or other type of tradesman.
There is so much to like about Ford cars, the radio controls are always user-friendly as is the air con and you also get a good old-fashioned handbrake.
Maybe it was the attractive Orange Glow colour of my test car, but I got a few people in supermarket car parks coming over to ask me about the Tourneo last week. It’s a very long motor, but as the bonnet is very short it means vision is good and it’s very easy to handle.
My test model was 2.0-litre diesel six-speed manual with 130 horse power and it wasn’t noisy.
If you are thinking of getting into the taxi business or limousine trips to the Airport or indeed around the country then the eight-seater Tourneo could the people carrier for you.
The seats are mounted on rails, which slide back and forth. So plenty of space for six people and there is still a huge amount of luggage space in the massive boot, officially it’s 1,300 litres. It’s also available in a nine-seater version and new versions of both the eight and nine-seaters will be on sale later this year.
There are sliding doors and a step for front and back seat passengers to climb on board. There is a plethora of very useful cubby holes to store mobile phones and drinks.
Ford are one of the many cars companies now making a big push toward electric cars. However we now know that we should be able to drive petrol and diesel cars after 2030 as the deadline for a complete switch to electric cars has been pushed back to 2035.
All that space doesn’t come cheap at a price of €77,100, so maybe a rental would be better if you only want the car for the summer months. However, the road tax of €1,250 is a bit mad.
