Adventure Reviews

The new Holden Colorado Z71 Xtreme takes the top-spec ute and adds a lot of hard-core extras. But does it transform the drive experience? And is it worth the cash? Let's find out.

For a hint at what a high country trip is like, Brindabella National Park offers fantastic scenery, plentiful wildlife and some real challenges for 4WDers.

The South Island of New Zealand, especially its tourism capital, Queenstown, is renowned for its myriad action and outdoor sports: bungy jumping, jet-boating, skiing, snowboarding, kite-skiing, tramping (hiking) and much more. There are also a stack of 4WD tracks – ranging in difficulty from suitable for a light-duty AWD through to hard-core trips that require a 4WD with an experienced driver, recovery gear, spares and preferably travelling with one or more other vehicles.Any getaway here can be as adrenalin-fuelled an experience as you want it to be.We opted for two day-trip loops out of Queenstown, a nice balance of light off-roading, local-area history and plenty of culture.

There is so much outback in Australia. Basically, the only place it isn't is along the eastern seaboard and around to Adelaide – everywhere else, pretty much, the red dirt continues all the way to the ocean and with it, all the splendour. As such, choosing an introduction to outback travel can be as simple as just driving somewhere in the west or north, or as hard as picking a favourite style of Mexican food – they're basically all the same, right?For my money, though, a trip through New South Wales' Corner Country makes a lot of sense. It starts in Cobar, about the closest bit of real red dirt west of Sydney, it travels through spectacular country, takes in a few wonderful pubs and has great camping all along the way, whether you want to pay for it or not.Best of all, the distances between settlements are not large, fuel is never too hard to get and, although the roads can be rough in parts, the trip is completely accessible for any well-prepared SUV with a bit of ground clearance and an understanding of the need to take things easy.Note: This trip is a mix of outback bitumen and gibber roads with occasional patches of bull-dust and it is dry-weather travel only.

Holden needs the Equinox to punch above its weight in the SUV stakes. Does the US-designed, Mexican-built five-seater pull it off?

Mazda's SUVs are more commonly found in an urban habitat. But a snow and ice drive session in The Land of the Long White Cloud shows the latest all-wheel drive versions of the top-selling CX-5, full-size CX-9, and seven-seat CX-8 are up to it off-road.

Snow's a funny old thing... it looks so lovely and firm and supportive, and really, it's just not that at all for the most part. It's cold and slippery and wet and treacherous and I'm not a fan, really.

It wasn't so long ago that Nissan's Navara was talked about in same hushed tones as Toyota's HiLux; it was right up there with the king of the utes. But when the D23 version launched in 2015, the wheels fell off for one of Australia's favourite pick-ups.  Designed around the notion that more dual-cab 4x4s were being

There was much anticipation over Merceds-Benz's foray into the realm of traditional workhorses prior to its X-Class launch earlier this year, and many people expected a lot from the premium brand's dual-cab ute.Benz certainly deserves praise for bringing the first ute offering AEB to the Aussie market, and let's hope the others swiftly follow suit, but has it delivered on the hype in other areas? Is the X-Class a fitting example of the three-pointed star brand, or is it just another manufacturer's missed opportunity at ute greatness? When we pitted a top-spec X-Class Power X250d against a Toyota HiLux Rugged X and Ford Ranger Wildtrak, the X-Class was a clear third place in that company, but this time we took a mid-spec Progressive out of the city and into the bush to see how it performed.

The 79 Series is as tough as a collection of tough stuff, but is Toyota's traditional-style ute actually any good? And what flaws - if any - does it reveal after two weeks and more than 2000km?