Verdict
With just two travel seats, the 659 is primarily a two-berth ’van, with capacity for overnight visitors. It offers loads of space, internal storage and enough payload to swallow all your wordly possessions. It’s lavishly equipped, with a comfy and stylish lounge, a large ensuite bedroom and a superb washroom. However, its size and weight could prove as much a headache as a luxury. It’s utterly uncompromising, though, and for that we love it.
Pros
Interior styling; reversing camera; panoramic skylight
Cons
No offside exterior access to storage; poor crockery storage; size
Living
The front lounge is large, with two full-length inward-facing sofas and both cab seats swivel so six can dine at mealtimes.
As with most side sofas, the backs are quite low and very upright, which is great for dining although not much fun for lounging. They are, however, press-studded in place so they don’t fly around in transit.
The 659, however, has side bolster cushions providing comfortable armrests and wonderful full-length, feet-up lounging while watching TV or just snoozing.
The 10-inch TV/DVD player above the cab seemed rather small for the size of the ’van but there is a secondary, drop-down bracket for a much larger flatscreen TV separating the lounge from the bedroom. This swivels through 180 degrees, so you can watch TV from bed should you choose; although you’d need to remove those fiddly venetian-style blinds.
A nice touch is the circular occasional table situated behind the driver’s seat. This is ideal for resting a coffee cup, nibbles or for tapping away on a laptop as there is a power socket above, just inside the cab area. There is a total of seven power sockets throughout the ’van. The larger freestanding table (100 x 60cm) is located under the bed and press-studded in place. It’s not the easiest place to retrieve it from, and we think it would have been better located in the wardrobe.
The opening, panoramic ‘Skyview’ rooflight above the cab floods the area with light, but Swift has thoughtfully added directional lights above the cab seats as well as the reading lights on the underside of the overhead lockers and two small ceiling lights. The windows get blinds and flyscreens, but also sheer drapes and full-width curtains.
Kitchen
The kitchen is massive and well-equipped. There’s a full-size cooker, with three gas rings and an electric plate, and an oven and separate grill below it. The 112-litre fridge is sensibly sized, with a separate freezer compartment, but additionally there is a large 12V/230V (40-litre) compressor freezer built into the chest sited opposite the kitchen.
The good-sized, granite-look sink has a clip-on drainer, and an inset cover to maximise working surface. Above the cooker is a microwave and the kitchen also comes complete with an extractor fan. The lighting above the kitchen area is also very good. However, the crockery storage isn’t particularly useful.
Between the fridge and the cooker is a storage cupboard with slide-out racks, which are very useful. Opposite the kitchen is a large double cupboard handy for pans and tins, and the top can be used for additional work space. The kitchen is also well supplied with electric points. Although this is a ’van for two people there would be no problem cooking a large meal for a family group.
Washroom
This area is extremely spacious. It’s a shade over 1m wide and stretches accross the full rear of the ’van. There’s a large, fully-lined, separate shower cubicle with two shelves for shampoo and the like; this area measures 84 x 61cm. There’s only one drain plug, though, and no vent directly above the shower cubicle.
If the perspex door had been opaque it would have provided more privacy for someone to use the toilet at the same time.
The rest of the washroom is carpeted and wood-panelled and has a washbasin and swivel-bowl Thetford toilet with separate flush tank. The storage space for toiletries is superb, with three large, shelved cupboards, as well as numerous other shelves and ledges. The icing on the cake is an opaque window, a locking door and a proper handle on the washroom door.
Beds
The two sofas in the front lounge make up into a relatively flat, large, full-width double bed without the need for infill cushions; it measures 200 x 90cm. Alternatively, if two single beds are the order of the day, then slide the sofa bases out a fraction and swivel the cab seats to bring them into play – they each measure 205 x 140cm.
Of course, the first-choice bed is the rear double, which measures 190 x 136cm at its widest, although the cut away is not excessive and with a domestic-style mattress it’s extremely comfortable. As there is no washroom alongside, which you find in most French bed layouts, it is much easier to get in and out of, and with a window both sides it makes the whole area feel very spacious.
Opposite the bed is a good-sized wardrobe with 130cm hang-height and shelved storage, too. A light comes on when you open the wardrobe door. Next to the wardrobe is a cupboard with an underwear drawer, and there are three large lockers above the bed, all shelved and wide enough to take folded shirts. In the corner is a useful little shelf for spectacles and watches, as well as two larger shelves above for books. The whole bedroom area can be closed off with a screen to make an ensuite bedroom (although the Venetian-style blind is somewhat see-through). We also liked the dedicated headboard and headroom at 80cm.
Storage
Internally there’s oodles of storage; cupboards, cubby holes, shelves, underbed, undersofas, and overcab storage areas. There is ample storage for two people to ‘full time’ in this ’van. Outside, however, is a different story, with only one locker under the offside sofa to take chairs, tables, levelling ramps, a generator, hoses, cables, walking boots, buckets and all the other paraphernalia that you don’t want inside the ’van.
Access to the lounge seat boxes and the area under the bed is simple, thanks to framed tops that raise easily on gas struts and are self-supporting. Anyone with anything large, such as a wheelchair, has nowhere to store it, even when dismantled. There is a roof rack but it would be difficult and impractical to put heavy items up there, so those with cycles or a wheelchair would have to invest in a cycle rack.
Technical Specifications
| Payload | 915 kg |
| MTPLM | 5000 kg |
| Shipping Length | 8.67 m |
| Width | 2.35 m |
