MERCEDES' MAGIC, NIGHT VISION ISN’T

WHERE do you look when you’re driving?

Personally, I’ve found that keeping an eye on the road in front is quite a good idea, unless, of course, you’re a woman.

Unfortunately, unlike girlies, I haven’t yet perfected the art of driving while also looking at the person you’re talking to.

Call me a typical bloke, eh? It’s just that I really do like to watch where I’m going.

And that’s why I couldn’t get the hang of “Night View Assist” – one of a mind-blowing £20,000-worth of extras fitted to the incredible new Mercedes S-Class I drove the other week. That’s a lot of cash.

Merc have been quietly replacing their entire range over the past 12 months.

Saloon-wise, the new C-Class arrived last summer. That was followed a few weeks later by a slightly bigger E-Class and the mighty top-of-the-range S-Class arrived in October.

They’re all fitted with Merc’s new “Blue Efficiency” programme and are surprisingly fuel efficient.

My S-Class was a £60,000 long-wheelbase version that was more than 17 feet long and six feet wide. You’d think that for that kind of cash you’d be wanting for nothing, and you’d be right.

Right, of course, unless you demanded seats that gave you a massage (not joking), upgraded leather, surround sound, one or two other ludicrously expensive gadgets and, of course, a £1,585 Night View Assist radar camera.

And what a waste of money it is.

Night View Assist replaces half your dashboard (it’s one vast electronic display) with a massive infra-red picture of the road and pavement in front.

It’s like playing one of those weird computer games where you are the night stalker and you have to spot your victim.

Fair enough, it works wonderfully well and you definitely would spot a pedestrian at night, even if he or she was wearing a black bedspread.

Trouble is, at the same time you’d be looking at your dashboard instead of where you were going. In fact, I switched it off apart from when I was trying to impress people.

So, gadgets apart, what do you get for the 60-grand it’ll cost you for the 3.0-litre, twin turbo diesel S-Class I drove?

Quite a lot actually. Its enormous list of standard equipment included pretty much everything you could ever want anyway.

It included headlights that dip automatically when someone comes the other way, full leather trim and a mass of safety kit that even included something called “attention assist” that monitors your driving to make sure you’re not nodding off.

With a massive 22-gallon fuel tank and an average 35mpg it means that your S-Class is good for 800 miles in between fill-ups, making it an astonishingly efficient long-distance vehicle.

There’s so much power you’ve still got that all-important big car acceleration and top speed to match its size and looks, though be warned: Merc have limited it to just the 155mph. D’oh.

Choose between comfort, normal and sport for its ride and gearchange characteristics, if you’re really that interested, which you won’t be.

It’s even got sports-style gearchange paddles on the steering wheel to make the best use of its seven-speed auto gearbox. You won’t want that either.

Just stick it in drive, select cruise control, and let the car do the rest.

Better still, if you can’t be bothered to watch where you’re going, sit in the back with a gin and tonic.

That’s definitely the place to be.

» MORE 'MOTORING' HERE...

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