"What did you say you do?"

"I didn't ..."

I reckon Toyota's advertisement people must have looked as hard for that particular smile of self-satisfaction as they worked on getting the style of the new Avensis right.

Because both really work just so.

At least to this writer. I liked the look of the new Avensis from the moment I saw the first picture, and it was an anticipation confirmed when I saw it in the metal.

And the interesting thing is, it looks totally individual within the current Toyota family. Unlike the strong similarity between the Corolla and the Camry, the one being a very successfully scaled down version of the other, Avensis has its own distinct style.

The term 'very European' is overworn. But perhaps 'not American' is closer. Not meant in any anti-American way, but Avensis is not sold in the US unlike its siblings, and it has a, well, Teutonic look?

No matter. It looks itself. And itself looks well, solid, imposing, sculpted.

Good enough to drive. Which I did, taking a day off from driving a computer to actually give this one a good workout through counties Wicklow, Carlow and Kildare.

I wouldn't take a day off like that for just any car.

So, off from Naas to Blessington, by Roadstone's Glen Ding Wood that is still a centre of environmental contention, then across Poulaphuca Lake via Valleymount and up along what has lately been labelled 'Braveheart Drive' to commemorate the making of the Mel Gibson film of the same name about a Scottish warrior who never set foot near the county.

Strange, isn't it? That we commemorate a celluloid hero in the same way as - in the same county - we salute the memory of a real one by giving him a 'Parnell Drive' not so far away.

But the road across the Wicklow Gap is a good one ever since a certain Ms Fox of independent persuasion managed to have a twisty and poorly-surfaced mountain forest road turned into a via fit for a Tour de France.

There's a point just below the ESB power station at Turlough Hill (a magnificent example of how to hide an industrial powerhouse, slightly tarnished by the marching line of metal men carrying the electricity down the gap) where one can often see the weather divide of the 'two Wicklows', and the silver Avensis marked it nicely.

To that point, the suspension had held the car tightly to the undulating surfaces, but a hint of the car's only real shortcoming had also become apparent. About which later.

Then down through the north face of the Glen of the Two Lakes (say it in Irish and you'll know), with a short stop halfway down to find that a coffee shop I'd used before was no longer open.

But at the bottom, and a slip around to the old graveyard and the Round Tower marking the centre of the Glendalough Archdiocese that in historical times was the religious rule centre for Dublin, and the souvenir sellers were out even on a cold and blustery April day. Behind them, the clear bubbling waters belched higher up by the mountain spluttered over rocks that might well have been there in the time of St Kevin.

So far, one thing that stood out on the new car was the silence. Of Lexus quality, almost, which just goes to show how much this 'everyday' Toyota has come on. And how hard it gets every day for Lexus to keep ahead.

The other was the comfort and support of the seats, already showing the promise of what was to be still there after more than 100 miles of driving.

Anyway, a left at Laragh brought us to the that most testing of sections if you want to drive at any speed, the undulations with their mid-air twists of the road to Rathdrum. It can be spectacular in the right car, but that needs rather more response than the 1.8-litre motor under the bonnet could provide.

That last is not a criticism. The VVT-i engine is a class act, amply powerful for normal driving, and as smooth and unintrusive as you could want here. But the new Avensis is a big car, and a sports car it will not be in this configuration.

Coffee then at Avondale House, the former home of that aforementioned Charles Stuart Parnell, which in itself is quite unprepossessing but set in an acreage of forest and trails that beg a return on a day less shivery. The apple-and-banana cake proved irresistable and sinfully satisfying.

The Parnell Way then led out to the Meeting of the Waters in the Vale of Avoca, and ultimately to the former weaving mill in the town of the same name that now depends for much of its income on visitors looking for Ballykissangel.

Fitzpatrick's Bar was closed, or looked like a currently unused film set, which might be the same thing. But lunch at the Avoca Handweavers shop - three cheeses, salad, and a tomato-and-basil soup - was probably a better choice anyway. In the clothing area, it was mostly for women, and in April there's a certain good value.

Then on through Arklow, without stopping this time, and a slip away before Gorey to Courtown Harbour, where I was a regular summer visitor as a child. The village centre looks so much smaller now, but healthier, and they've been doing great things to the little harbour where solicitor Tommy O'Connor used to keep his motorboat and bring us kids out for water-splashed spins.

I continued the nostalgia bit and drove out past Riverchapel and its mandatory masses through Ardamine - where some of those familiar wooden holiday houses still stand - and finally to Poulshone, where also still stands the many-windowed house that my father used to rent to dispose of the family for two months of a summer.

The beach is gone, though, and I could see serious rock defences put up against the waves that want to swallow the land and the houses.

And so back up towards the homecounty, but slowly. At a crossroads near Kilmuckridge I found O'Brien's Bar, thatched, genuinely old world ... and open, unusual now in daytime for remote country pubs.

There was a fire just lit, and a couple who between them knew, separately, friends of mine from my younger days, on the one hand when Kilcullen Drama Group was a regular visitor to the Kilmuckridge Drama Festival, and on the other an artist, Paul Funge, who brought U2 to Gorey on one of their earlier gigs.

The last of the journey was through Ferns, and Bunclody - to where I used to go in my early 20s at weekends and bring my sister out from Bunclody FCJ (the boarders called it 'first class jail') school for her lunch and an afternoon out of cloisters - and then on the much improved road from Tullow to Castledermot to Kilcullen.

Without a twinge, without a hassle of any kind, and also, it has to be said, without any heartstopping excitement. And with a fuel consumption registering on the trip system that is far too good to mention here without checking it further.

All in all, this new Avensis is a motor for the modern age. Safe, good-looking, absolutely competent. It is a couple of notches above the Avensis which it replaces, in size, in market placing, in overall satisfaction.

Those used to the former car will be surprised in a number of ways. They will feel, perhaps, unnerved by the luxury feel and accommodation that now becomes an Avensis standard. It is a car moved to the Mondeo/Passat upper end of its segment.

And yet they'll be able to have a 1.6-litre petrol engine if they want. Unlike the Ford, but like the Opel Vectra which found God after an initial period of apostacy and came back to the Irish requirement with a 1.6 of their own.

At the other end of the scale, they will at some stage in the future also be able to have a 'power option' with the 2.4-litre Camry engine under the bonnet, which will make the new Avensis a full market match for one of the much-improving contenders chasing this Toyota model's 16-out-of-17-years top dog in the segment slot, the Mazda6.

And - in that context - I reckon Toyota are already working on the small weakness which was the only one I found that day I went mitching behind its wheel.

The steering is not up to the same standard as the rest of the car. It is mushy, slightly unresponsive, needs sharpening. On the open good highway, it is just a feeling. When you get onto one of those classic Irish back roads like the link from Poulshone up to O'Brien's Bar, with half a dozen different camber statements in every square yard, it becomes a mild handfull to maintain a straight line.

And because the rest of the car is so good, they really have to attend to this.

The new Avensis is something of a jewel, really, but with a small flaw.

And when they polish that one out, I'll then take it back to Avondale House, in the summer ... and maybe back to Courtown, too.