Why not kick off the new year with a new toy? Well, that’s precisely what blog editor Ian did when he added a slightly frayed at the edges, high mileage T5 to his fleet…

We moved to Brittany, France, five years ago, taking a 2002 right-hand drive Audi A6 Avant with us for regular family transport. Following the birth of our twin girls in 2013, which took our kid count up to five, a seven-seater Peugeot 806 joined the ranks. It was only my second French car (the first being a 205GTi) – and the first non-VAG vehicle I’ve owned for about 20 years – and while I shuddered at the thought of owning something ‘foreign’ the 806 proved surprisingly reliable. Alas, the problem with children is that they grow – and when our 13-year-old son started whinging about leg cramp on long journeys, I began my search for an alternative.

And that’s where the idea of buying a T5 originated. The problem with traditional MPVs is that while some have lots of seats, this is at the expense of boot space. Whereas, the T5 would provide the best of both worlds – and it was a VW!

Initially I had dreams of owning a posh, post 2010 facelift model, or at least a low mileage earlier example – but alas T5s seem to hold their value and I soon realised there was no way my measly budget was going to stretch that far. To make matters worse, T5s are even dearer here in France than they are in the UK which got me looking at the option of buying a right-hand drive in order to increase my buying power. I even toyed with the idea of picking one up in Germany, although the prospect of forking out on a flight based on an internet advert didn’t exactly fill me with glee.

Thankfully, as luck would have it, a suitable T5 turned up much closer to home. Just a few kilometres, in fact, on a classified website called Leboncoin (‘the good corner’); a 2003 nine-seater short-wheelbase with a 130bhp 2.5 TDi engine. Best of all, it was well within my budget at just €6500 (£5000). At first sight, it all looked surprisingly straight and honest. It belonged to a taxi company, hence the not too insignificant 297,000km (yes, really), but a wad of main dealer receipts from the local VW dealership where it was bought originally assured me that it had been looked after. After all, if you run a taxi business, reliability has to be a big priority. Bodily it’s actually very good – the green paint’s original (its an old T4 colour) and the only real eyesore is the bonnet – the paint’s come off where they had obviously tried to remove transfers carrying the company name.

A test drive convinced me that while not my ‘dream’ T5 by any means, it would provide an ideal and affordable solution to our car conundrum and a deal was struck at €6000.

The nice thing is the fact that it’s a bog standard, poverty spec model with wind-up windows and PVC seats – perfect for the abuse five kids are likely to throw at it. The seating arrangement itself seems to work pretty well for us; there’s three seats at the front, a double with a single pew in the middle row and a three-seater bench at the rear. All have three-point belts.

Okay, it’s only got a sliding side door on one side which is a bit of a bind – and the colour’s, well, different. But on the whole I love it – it’s wonderfully accommodating, feels solid and is nice to drive with its lofty seating position. It’s got a towbar, too, so I can mount my four-bike Atera Strava rack, and even the short wheelbase version features a good sized boot for prams and other paraphernalia.

Mechanically, touch wood, it all seems fine. Fuel consumption is around 35mpg overall which I don’t think is too bad given its size, the engine – and the fact that it’s lugging around so many people. The fact that diesel’s now dropped to around a euro a litre in France certainly helps!

Inevitably, of course, I am already looking at what I can do to improve its appearance. Lowering springs are high on my agenda to sort out the ride height, and I’d like some nice alloy rims without going too radical. It would be nice to replace the front bumper with a colour-coded Caravelle style item – and a full body wrap would be awesome. I am a big cycling fan and recently while in the UK spotted a Sky T5 van with Mark Cavendish and the rest of the Sky team splashed all over it. Now that would look cool…

Ian

The opinions expressed here are the personal opinions of the author and do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of VW Heritage