Bigger Fish To Fry

Hyundai’s eight-seater flagship takes a berth as we rally the troops

- Ash Westerman

HYUNDAI PALISADE HIGHLANDER

Price (MSRP) $75,000

This month 346km @ 11.6L/100km

Total 346km @ 11.6L/100km

WHAT DO YOUgive the bloke who’s just handed back a large, seven-seater Korean SUV, in which he only ever managed to fill two of those seats at any one time?

Easy! Give him an even larger Korean SUV that seats eight.

Not that I’m complaining, and the transition to this top-spec Palisade Highlander diesel will be instructive in terms of how it compares to that top-spec Kia Sorento I ran for the last four months. No, the two do not eye-to-eye segment rivals due to the Palisade being slightly larger and featuring a three-seat third row (versus two in the third row for the Kia), but the model line-ups of both do overlap enough on the price that they’ll surely be cross-shopped by some buyers for whom the third-row accommodation is not a deal-breaker either way.