Full review

The new Chausson 620 is no bigger on the inside than it is on the outside – that’s 6.96m long by 2.35m wide. But I can’t think of another seven-metre ’van that feels so spacious.

It retains the best bits of last year’s Motorhome of the Year, the 610 – the back end mix of palatial bathroom, wardrobe and external lockers. Up front, however, it adopts a lounge more akin to the discontinued Suite range, with a central travel seat and two smaller side pews.

But it doesn’t suffer the price premium of the Suite. It is just £1,600 more than an equivalent 610, and you can order it in entry-level Flash trim (from £42,250). It also eschews the centre kitchen. This allows the central lounge/travel seat to recline and allows Chausson to create the industry’s first – and so far, only – drop-down island bed.

Once the bed has been lowered, you have to push it forwards into the cab. The exertion involved is no greater than getting dressed in the morning.

Like other Chaussons, the bed can be ‘parked’ at two levels, the first of which allows decent headroom above (780mm) and just enough room below for an occasional extra bed, created from the seats.

With the bed brought down all the way, the mattress is just 630mm off the floor, with a length of just over two metres and a width (at shoulder level, where it matters) of 1.40m.

The backrests of the cab seats can be used to prop you up for reading. Books can be deposited in the overcab shelves and the cab’s sunroof provides masses of ventilation.

Before you achieve this utopia, you have to have the cab chairs facing rearwards with their armrests up, the backrest cushions of the side seats need to be removed, as does the squab cushion of the forward-facing bench, and the centre seat’s backrest has to be folded.

You can have your 620 as a Flash or a Welcome, and either version comes on Ford or Fiat chassis. Then there are three fabrics, two furniture finishes and two cab colours.

But before you fine-tune the spec, you need to realise that the VIP Pack – at £3,600 – is one of those can’t-really-buy-it-without ‘options’ that are all too frequent in motorhome pricing. The pricing of the pack also effectively widens the gap between Flash and Welcome to £4,600. That’s a fair chunk of money considering that the two ’vans have the same layout and construction. But there are reasons why you will prefer the Welcome - moulded rear panel with LED tail lights, extra interior lighting, opening overcab sunroof, AES fridge, TV bracket.

The (extra cost) Elite leather-look fabric in the interior was already beginning to look a bit untidy in places, and while its chocolate and white colouring certainly adds to the bright feel, I couldn’t help wondering about its durability.

On the outside, Chausson’s 2016 graphics are bolder and more eye-catching, while there’s more good stuff under the skin: thicker XPS insulation, composite framing instead of wood, a GRP underfloor skin and, thanks to these changes, a seven-year water ingress warranty.

With the VIP Pack added, the cab also has all the electric goodies you require, although you’ll have to dig deeper if you want the potentially life-saving ESP (packaged together with Traction+ and Hill Descent at £464).

On the road, the Ducato still impresses. And that’s with just the standard 130 Multijet unit. Yes, you can upgrade, but why bother when the steepest climbs are dispatched easily in third gear, and, despite the tortuous terrain, it still returned nearly 25mpg? Save your money for that ESP option.

Or you could just buy a Ford. It costs £1,300 less, comes with ESP as standard, and is more car-like.

Where the 620 beats almost every motorhome in its class is in its external storage capacity. The whopper garage comes with triple access doors, and an internal height of 1.25m (over four feet) should mean carrying a couple of bikes is no problem.

I quickly became won over by the 620’s lounge. Those side seats won’t be your first choice, but they do take the on-site capacity up to six. The large tabletop doesn’t get in the way, because a squeeze of a single handle is all that’s required to move it in any direction. It’s the central seat that I really liked, however. It can be reclined to any angle of your choosing. But I did find myself wishing for deeper side windows, especially when parked in the mountains wanting to enjoy their splendour.

The rear washroom is so good that there is no need to use the campsite’s facilities. With a really generous shower, plenty of storage, an enormous wardrobe plus plenty of room to get changed, there’s almost nothing to fault here. Except that the tambour door was a bit sticky on its runners and the toilet roll wouldn’t stay on its holder while I drove.

The kitchen, however, is a bit tight on worktop space. It does have three gas rings, lots of drawers, a huge fridge/freezer opposite and a neat little rail onto which you can hang small implements. UK spec will see an oven/grill replace one of those drawers.

This is an abridged version of the full review appearing in the January 2016 issue of MMM.