The Challenge: Two slopes, one day, one tank of fuel

We've lined up a simple, but daunting test for the recently-facelifted Subaru Forester. Get from Milton Keynes to Aviemore in Scotland with enough time to ski at either end.

And it needs to be done on just one tank of diesel.

Mountains are a bit thin on the ground in southern England, so the first part of the challenge starts at the Snow Zone - an indoor artificial slope, before heading to Cairngorm Mountain in Scotland.

Theoretically, the Forester has a range of more than 700 miles, which would be fine if it was a straight, flat run. But it's not. Through the Lake District and Highlands will work the engine hard, while any stop-start traffic in road works will bring the range down considerably. To make sure that we make it, we'll need to average more than 44mpg for the entire trip.

The Car

The Subaru Forester is a 4x4 without the bulk. It strikes a great compromise between a traditional estate and a small off-roader, like a Toyota RAV-4 or Nissan X-Trail.

It should be well suited to this trip for its practicality (the boot is 450 litres, but with the seats down is a generous 1610 litres), decent fuel consumption and the reassurance of all-wheel drive if the roads get a bit icy in Scotland.

This models benefits from a 2010 facelift. The changes are subtle, but effective with a redesigned instrument cluster, instantaneous MPG display on clock, suspension upgrades for better roadholding one-touch folding rear seats and a reversing camera with Bluetooth with hands-free connectivity.

Read the full Subaru Forester Review here

The Route

The 500-mile route from Milton Keynes takes us up the M1 to Birmingham, before joining the M6 to Scotland, M74 from Glasgow and then the A9 through the Highlands to Aviemore.

So how did we get on? Did the Forester make it? Click to find out >>>