Reliable, simple and good-looking, the third-gen Toyota Hilux Surf is quintessentially a cult classic.

Toyota builds the most robust vehicles in the world.

Take a look at the challenges that Top Gear put its Hilux through. You’ll find a Toyota Hilux on someone’s farm, on a builder’s construction site, and even at the forefront of war. It is a legendary nameplate that is synonymous with hard yakka.

During the late 1980s, the sport utility vehicle became a thing, and Toyota’s answer to that craze was the Surf, or 4Runner in America. These original wagons were robust off-roaders built with the best bones of a Hilux commercial vehicle, albeit with much-needed luxury and amenities. With a coil rear end, sumptuous cabin and climate control air conditioning, it really is a place of  High Luxury.

The petrol 2.7-litre 3RZ engine is an absolute workhorse and won’t let you down. This ‘Sports Runner’ model is a rear-wheel-drive version of the Surf that comes from the factory with exclusive touches like white-face gauges, faux-carbon interior inlays and a significantly lowered factory ride height.

It is reminiscent of an American-spec 4Runner and those other early-generation USDM wagons of the 90s era, now synonymous with optimism and better times.

That idea of an off-road-based wagon was a novel concept that birthed a whole segment of vehicles, with the most closely related being products like the Toyota Fortuner.

Nothing hits like the original, though, with its era-specific styling and old-school workhorse powertrain.