Behind the scenes | Hidden talents

It’s been many years since the game-changing Subaru Forester and Toyota RAV4 arrived, but even though they burst onto the SUV scene at about the same time, their respective USPs were at polar opposite ends of the spectrum.

As it happened, the location couldn’t have turned out more perfectly.

How we shot the feature

Not only does the countryside surrounding Broadford in central Victoria provide the perfect backdrop of stunning rolling hills, it’s also home to some great driving roads and decent off-road trails.

The protecting Armco barriers bore the signs of previous more enthusiastic drivers and, the site of one particularly unsuccessful attempt on a tightening right even had a message sprayed on the mangled metal – ouch.

But we were even luckier when it came to the off-road testing. By absolute chance, Subaru was hosting an event not 10km down the road at the Broadford Motorcycle Complex.

With a little inside help, we were kindly allowed to commandeer the excellent 4×4 track, while Subaru went about presenting its staff with the new XV Hybrid on the tight and twisting motorbike track.

Our focus was, of course, the pair of Japanese SUVs, but it was sometimes difficult to explain that to director Matt who had brought along his heavily modified Ford Maverick as a support vehicle and was completely in his element.

While it looks like we are at the end of a long and adventurous route through almost inaccessible trails, the McDougall Reservoir is actually less than a kilometre from the centre of Broadford township and accessed through a housing estate.

While I hope the water was safe enough for a dip, what you don’t see is the broken glass and a dumped washing machine I had to wade past to get the shot of me floating away on my inflatable llama.

Clearly, pool floatie surfing is not my hidden talent.