Volkswagen Family Day - VW Sharan Car Review

As a Rise and Shine partner, my family and I were invited to the recent Volkswagen Family Weekend. I am a little late in writing about this, as it was Bun's birthday last week! We had relatives in town for the celebration, and it was few happy, busy days for us.

In short, I have to say that Volkswagen and Rise & Shine did a fabulous job. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves and Bubbles has asked to go again!

There were hot mini burgers, roast potatoes, ice-cream with various toppings, juices, coffee and tea made available for all. I thought the food and drinks were generous, and was glad we came with empty stomachs.

As it was Mother's Day weekend, there was a lovely pampering corner just for mothers, where various OTO massage machines were placed for mothers to use. I managed to get a much needed leg massage while nursing Bun in here.

There were many activities planned for the kids, and this tricycle area was Bubbles' absolute favourite. Although she rides a bigger bicycle at home, this set-up with road markings and signs was really fun to her. We were there early so she had the opportunity to ride several times.

Social enterprise Nutriville was there to organise several food art activities for children, including coffee painting, vegetable printing, and working with dough. The simple art work made nice keepsakes for children to take home.

Of course, besides participating in all the various activities, we were also there to test drive the VW Sharan! We bought a new car just last year, so Bubbles knew what it meant to go for a test drive, and was terribly excited. This is how the car looks from the front:

We had to wait a while for the VW folks to fit in two VW car seats for our girls. I thought it was visually appealing to have such matching seats (considering our own our orange and brown!). Bun was facing forward for the very first time, and she too, was thrilled to be in a different car. She kept smiling and waving to the sales rep who was seated in front! Like that:

The dashboard, and my dashing man('s knees) ;)

I am one of those people who knew close to nothing about cars before I owned one. We bought our first car in 2008, and prior to that, I wasn't even able to identify many car brand logos. Yes, I was that bad. I am proud to say that I have come a pretty long way since then, mostly due to car education from Roboman, and reading his many car magazines scattered around our home.

That said, I will focus on describing a few key features that I really like about the Sharan - the technical features can be found in the last photo of this post, and also on the VW website. If you are familiar with the VW ads where members of a family wear helmets, that is for the Touran, a popular mini-MPV model. The Sharan is a newer model, and bigger car.

As expected for a VW, the 7-seater car is well-built and sturdy. The interior is spacious, and its seats had comfortable leather. The drive was smooth, and the car was nice and quiet.

I first noticed that the windows have built-in sun-shades. I love this practical feature! It serves its purpose while looking neat and beautiful. When aesthetics are considered along with real needs, it is a big plus in my books!

The car boasts a moon-roof AND a sun-roof. For those who are unfamiliar, the former is a glass roof, and the latter a roof window that opens up. As our current car also has a moon-roof, I must say that it is an excellent kid-friendly feature - it is great for distracting crying babies and especially fun when there are pretty Christmas lights to view! The sun-roof is an added bonus, and will be great for cool evenings - to get in some fresh air. Of course, the entire thing can be closed up at the touch of a button too; for hot, sunny days where all you want is shade.

As a family with young ones, and frequent live-in guests, we were especially interested in boot space. The back seats fold completely flat, excellent for large objects like suitcases and such. Otherwise, boot space is still generous, even with the seats up. We could easily fit two our our strollers in there.

I guess the most telling was when Bubbles declared during the test-drive:  
I really like this car, Daddy! Can you buy it?

If we haven't bought a similar (albeit smaller) car so recently, I would be singing the same tune!