Standing 186cms tall, or a shaving under 6 foot 2 in old money, I feel a slight unease whenever duty dictates that I spend time at the wheel of something so small as the Suzuki Wagon R+.

Thanks to the vehicle's high stance and wide-opening doors, entry is a matter of sliding directly into the seats, which are a bit on the narrow side for those of more substantial build, but comfortable enough otherwise. The steering wheel has a light feel to it in spite of the standard airbag, but no tilt adjustment of the column combines with the driving seat's fairly basic adjustments to mean that, rather than adjust the car to yourself, you adjust to the car.

The seats can, however, be adjusted every which-way, including into a double-bed of sorts.

Top of the dashboard is so heavily sculpted, it will probably be a challenge for any company to mould a protective dash cover mat for it and include the clock ! Standard equipment in the GL model tested includes a rear window washer/wiper, power front windows, power steering, power doorlocks and handy storage boxes under the front seats. (The rear `wing', purpose of which I never quite fathomed out, is an option.)

The up-spec GL also has a double drink holder which is capable of securely holding the popular 500ml flavoured milk bottle and a mobile phone - ideal equipment for an urban runabout.

There is no doubt that Wagon R+ is perfect in the urban environment, scuttling through heavy traffic and parking in spaces where bigger cars dare not try to fit, but it copes much better than expected on the open road.

It gets up to cruising speed with relative ease, then cruises happily enough at 110kmh with the tachometer needle sitting on a steady 4000rpm. However, a little care is advised for overtaking, as it has scant reserves of power/torque left over by that time, and increases speed gradually.

The suspension is reasonably forgiving of bumps and thumps - you still feel them, no mistake about that, and Wagon R tends to pitch about a little on its tiddler wheelbase.

Yet driven within the self-imposed constraints of its design, Wagon R+ can be fun on the right road. There is a bit of clearly evident bodyroll, coupled with front-drive understeer, but it's predictable and easily controlled.

NVH levels are fairly high (the engine can always be heard buzzing happily away under the hood) and wind noise was higher than expected. Our test car had optional weathershields on all four doors which are quite clever and would allow windows to be slightly open even in rain, but they are also the prime suspects for causing more than their share of the noise.

But road grumble, even on coarse chip bitumen, was much lower than expected.

The air conditioning fitted to our test car seemed hard-pressed to cope with heatwave conditions (it's actually quite a large box inside the Wagon R), but did not place a noticeable drag on the engine. And that was reflected in our fuel consumption, which averaged over a wide variety of conditions at 6.8L/100km (42mpg).