It's big," said the delightful chap who runs this page. This was not happy news. My accident rate makes formula one fall-guy Pedro Diniz look like a successful driver, and the prospect of driving an MPV was worrying. I find parking my Golf difficult enough; I would surely need a street to myself for this beast.
Worse news was to follow. The person delivering the car had had an altercation with a taxi which resulted in a dent in the near-side passenger door. If he was having trouble, what chance did I have? Look, perhaps someone else ought to have a crack at this. But no, the die was cast. There she was on the top floor of the NCP, gleaming in the sun, stubbily appealing and less intimidating than I had expected. Maybe this was going to be manageable after all - even if after my first spin in the car I proved incapable of re-parking it within those irritatingly narrow white lines.
Honda, in its ads for the Stream, presents it as the car that allows you to have it all: a seven-seater that doesn't look like a bus; a fun car that accommodates a large family; an MPV that thinks it's a GTi. "Life is full of choices," says the ad, and this is how to avoid having to make any. Clever stuff, though its idea of a cutting-edge challenge to convention - "Why can't you wear jeans and a suit jacket?" - is a trifle bathetic.
The shape of the car is derived from the five-door Honda Civic. While it is by no means elegant, it has a certain charm and is far from boxy. It replaces Honda's previous people carrier, the Shuttle, and is being pitched as an SAV (sports activity vehicle), a kind of grown-up relation of the SUV. You're a parent, you're surrounded by small children, but you wear your responsibilities lightly and still know how to have fun. Galaxy man (or woman) is a solid citizen with a practical take on life; Stream man (or ditto) combines practicality with pizazz: he (or she) has a bit more zest for life, a little more spontaneity.
Perhaps insufficient consideration was given to the niceties of who should test this car. A large family would seem de rigueur. I have a wife and one very tall son, but that didn't quite seem to qualify. It fell to the latter to try out all the seats. The back two are impossibly small for anyone over about 4ft 10in; so young children only here. The middle three offer more leg room, but three adults would be a bit of a squeeze. Boot space is very limited, though all five seats fold down if you want to dispense with the children and take lots of luggage instead. It may claim to be a seven-seater, but that would be pushing it; five plus luggage would be ideal.
It is smaller than most MPVs - more like a taller version of an estate car - and is, as the ad claims, fun to drive. It handles well, doesn't feel heavy and even the automatic I was testing offered good acceleration from the two-litre engine. I had expected to have to adjust my driving to allow for a bigger vehicle, but that didn't prove necessary. It's simple to drive, I wasn't forever worrying about the width of the gap I had to drive through, and even parking wasn't quite the nightmare I had anticipated.
On the motorway it was nippy. The driving position is higher than in an ordinary saloon, which gave me greater confidence, even if it did nothing for my wife's (when I'm driving, her preferred position is under the seat). The only drawback was that the headrests on the passenger seats slightly interfered with my view out of the back window, forcing me to use the near-side mirror more than I normally do (probably a welcome development).
The automatic version of the Stream also has manual override. Philosophically, I can't quite see the point of this: if you opt for an automatic, why would you sometimes want to revert to the chore of changing gear? But, apparently, this is increasingly common: you can have the automatic in town and take full control in the country.
The manual gear changes are extremely easy - a nudge on the gear stick to go up or down through the four gears. I didn't quite grasp the system initially and spent the first 10 minutes driving around in first (the car took to this surprisingly well, but apologies to Honda if it has caused any long-term damage). Thereafter, my only problem was remembering which gear I was in without being able to feel the position of the gear stick.
Now the tricky bit. The Stream has an i-VTEC engine, an enhanced version of Honda's fabled VTEC system. This is very important , though I have yet to grasp precisely why. Something to do with maximising efficiency by permitting a variable camshaft position. My son made several valiant attempts to explain how this worked, but each required at least a passing knowledge of the internal combustion engine. When I asked Honda's press man what it meant, he assured me it was all to do with the alignment of the cam lobes and the upshot was "two engines in one". So that's marvellous, if impenetrable.
I seemed to get through a tank of petrol with pocket-emptying ease, but perhaps this reflected my driving style. Average fuel consumption of 32.8mpg for the manual and 31mpg for the automatic is reasonable for a vehicle of this power, though it is bested by the two-litre version of the Renault Scenic, which manages 35.3mpg. Perhaps that's the price you pay for wanting the treacle tart as well as the sticky toffee pudding.
