Here’s a sneak preview of one of the 2011-season’s most eagerly awaited motorhomes: the new-look Escape by Swift Group.

 

Two years after the entry-level range’s launch – during which time it won several awards and has firmly established itself as Swift Group’s best-selling range – it’s enjoyed an impressive external and interior make-over, and will take its bow at the NEC’s Boat and Caravan Show in February. We’ll reveal our first impressions, along with our full photographic treatment, in the March issue of Practical Motorhome (on sale 19 January), but until then, we’ve posted a short interior video, below, to whet your appetite.

 

Priced at £34,185 OTR, the 622, featured here, is a four-berth with one belted passenger seat. Our first impressions: the new look is striking. The blue cabin paintwork is more cleverly connected to the caravan body thanks to sweeping new graphic treatments. New wheel trims are an improvement on the original range, too.

 

The woodgrain finish throughout the interior is called Mali Acacia, and looks slightly darker to us than that in the original Escape.

 

In the living quarters, the cost-cutting you might expect from a budget ’van isn’t immediately apparent to the untrained eye. Okay, so the habitation windows don’t have pleated blinds, in the kitchen area chef will have to make do with the limitations of a combined oven and grill with three-burner hob, and kitchen storage is devoid of fancy wire vegetable racks – there are just good old-fashioned lockers.

 

But none of these detract from what is a very impressive overall package at this price point. Take the washroom: not only does it get the modern-looking Thetford C250 cassette toilet with wheeled holding tank, but unlike many ‘budget’ motorhomes, it gets a dedicated trigger-type shower head that’s separate from the tap in the corner basin. And we just love the wraparound lounge in the 622 model, which could be used as two single beds (one sofa measures 190cm, the other slightly less) or a massive double.

 

Swift Group has injected a healthy dose of extra showroom sizzle to its best-selling range at a time when it’s most needed – when VAT rates have risen to 20 per cent and it’s harder than ever for motorcaravanners to buy new.

 

[tl:movies]