When a husband gets a birthday card from his wife saying hunk, gorgeous, sexy and handsome she's probably got other things than motoring on her mind.

But to most men the same adjectives could apply to the Nissan X Trail, athough the handsome would have to be someone like Charles Bronson in his prime. Tom Cruise is certainly not an X Trail type.

In fact the X Trail has man appeal but all right it's a different type of vehicle, it doesn't have any of that feminine feel you get when you climb into a Honda CR-V.

In Japanese talk the Nissan would be the all action Sumo wrestler while the Honda would be the little guy holding the towels.

So when the rain came down and the tracks got all muddy and slithery, it was a good time to put the X Trail through its paces. No problem. Three feet of water, pot holes or whatever it just kept on going saying: "Is that your best shot?"

And this isn't even at the top of the range when it comes to running off road with the Nissan range.

The Patrol, Terrano and the Navaro will go steeper and dig deeper than the X Trail. You're spoilt for choice when you come to Nissan and they're all good.

The X trail, big that it is, is an extremely easy vehicle to drive. My daughter tried it out on the disused airfield near to us and for a 10-year-old she did well.

No just joking. She's a 21-year-old trying to pass her driving test and she's learning in her mother's Renault Megane Coupe.

That's like being in a two man submarine and she struggles. Getting behind the wheel of the X Trail was a revelation.

She reversed, parallel parked and manoeuvred like a dream. It was the first time she had been behind the wheel of a SUV and her mother now has plans for a new car.

I didn't have sufficient time to do enough off road to give a full report but what I did was super. Find a dirty track, impassable for your average saloon, engage 4WD and off you go.

It's a piece of cake and I was yet to get behind the wheel of a Pathfinder.

So are there any buts? Just a minor one and that's purely a personal thing for me the steel floor of the boot. My golf clubs kept sliding round and irritating me pretty picky stuff, huh?

It's designed to make it easier to clean but as I seem to do a lot of moving around the country helping a wife, child and dog I'd probably put a piece of Wilton in the back and make it easier on my niblick.

I also liked having the X Trail outside my home.

It looked good and we're all a little bit impressed with a good looker.

Performance-wise it was a dream. Sure it's a big mother and with the diesel can be a bit slowish for the first few yards.

But after that, look out because the power is awesome and even at 80mph the engine is saying: "Still plenty to go," and you're in no way thrashing the engine.

Tremendous machine.