These days, every car pretends it’s an SUV. Hairdressers and vicars’ wives drive around in aggressively styled ‘crossover’ vehicles fitted with bull-bars, running boards and such high driving positions you’d think they’re on their way to deliver aid to some war-torn country, rather than nipping down to Waitrose for a few cases of Whispering Angel.
Fact is, when it comes to really rugged motoring, there’s only ever been a handful of truly tough guys with their waxed hats firmly in the ring. There’s the American daddy, the Jeep (whose 50-year-old Cherokee line is a classic); the Mercedes G-Wagen; the Land Rover Defender; and, the longest continuously running model of them all, the Toyota Land Cruiser.
Yep, at the risk of bursting the bubbles of dyed-in-the-wool Landy lovers, I’m obliged to tell you that their beloved, and rather beautiful Defender didn’t evolve from the ‘Land Rover 110’ until 1983.
You see, the Land Cruiser, born nearly 30 years prior out of the Toyota BJ – which started life even earlier in 1951 – has always been more about durability, reliability and sheer off-road chops than just superficial style and image. The ‘BJ’ designation stands for ‘B-series engine’ and ‘Jeep’, in case you’re curious.
Even before it was launched, the BJ became, during road tests, the very first vehicle to successfully climb to the sixth station of Mount Fuji, where no automobile had gone before. Even now, you’re more likely to spot its direct descendant, the Land Cruiser, helping save lives at a refugee camp in South Sudan than parked outside a Michelin-starred restaurant in South Kensington.
It’s become the go-to vehicle for many of the world’s armies and police forces, as well as NGOs and humanitarian organisations such as the International Red Cross and United Nations which use them for traversing the forbidding landscapes of conflict zones and disaster areas. Hell, the car was even born on the battlefield: factories in US-occupied Japan created its predecessor, the BJ, for transporting American troops around the region following North Korea’s 1950 invasion of its southern neighbour.
So that’s its hero credentials all sorted. But what does the latest iteration of Toyota’s longest-running production model (worldwide sales of more than 11.3 million in 170 countries to date) bring to the average driver for whom ‘navigating rough terrain’ means driving through that dodgy housing estate in Tower Hamlets?
Well, there’s a re-engineered 2.8-litre turbodiesel engine with a new eight-speed automatic transmission for one. Developing 500Nm of maximum torque, this hefty powertrain allows loads of up to 3,500kg to be towed (that’s an awful lot of Whispering Angel). Plus there’s a 48V mild hybrid model on the way later this year.
The car also adopts the new body-on-frame Toyota New Global Architecture GA-F platform which provides the foundation for significantly increased rigidity and excellent response, ride and handling,both on and off-road.
Externally, the classic retro silhouette references the definitive lines of the early Land Cruiser models. The bonnet has raised corners and a lowered central section that gives the driver a commanding view, while the shaping of body parts also helps avoid damage in harsh driving conditions. The ‘Camel Trophy beige’-coloured one Toyota lent me certainly feels like a reassuringly safe space to be in, even before I press the start-button that brings the functionally elegant 12.3” instrument display to life.
I’ve donned my butchest looking hat and toughest pair of Blundstone boots especially for the occasion and, climbing inside – I’m 6’2” but still have to use one of the many grab-handles provided to haul myself up – feel like I’m ready to drive around Jurassic Park (in which the Land Cruiser featured, as well as Independence Day and Mad Max: Fury Road), rather than Richmond Park, where I’m actually heading.
I may have to hold my breath and pray as I try to inch its nearly two-metre girth through the width restrictions at Rotherhithe. But once through, I feel safe in the knowledge that there’s almost nowhere on Earth this Land Cruiser can’t take me – and my precious stash of Provençal rosé.
From £74,995 on-the-road, toyota.co.uk
