We only had the car for a week, I could have driven the Kia forever. I didn’t want to give it back at the end of my review. I told you all about the divine intervention that happened while I was reviewing the 2012 Kia Sorento EX AWD and I told you that the fabulous SUV inspired me to make a dish with a kick. But I haven’t told you all about how much my family loved the 2012 Kia Sorento.
As much as we loved it, I’m going to start off with the one thing that was negative for us. The car seats are not easy to install. The latch system is hard to get to and it’s difficult to push the car seat attachments into it. Not a big deal because once you have them installed you usually leave them in.
What we did like…everything else!
I loved the size of the Kia Sorento. The Kia Sorento is smaller than my van so it’s a lot easier for me to park. While I was going into Seattle one day with the kids I had to park in a parking garage and I hate parking garages. They always seem so small and tight and of course I was nervous as all get out being in a car that wasn’t mine but the Kia Sorento maneuvers really well and gave me enough room to park in those tiny spots without worrying about my behind sticking out. Size wise, there isn’t as much storage as our van has. It’s just a smaller vehicle, but all the back seats can go flat. The middle seats don’t go completely flat but if you need to bring something big home you still have a lot of added room with the fold down feature.
Heated seats, I love heated seats. My van has heated seats. Plus I just loved the look of the interior. The dash, the doors, the textures, I felt like I was driving a fun car with pizazz and flavor!
GPS, Sirius radio, personal climate control and bluetooth phone connections are also three extra good checkmarks in my book. I get lost EVERY time I go to Seattle and when I went to Seattle in the Kia, I had the GPS to get me in and out without a hitch. There’s something about my phone’s GPS that always quits working when I’m lost. So my next vehicle will have built in GPS without a doubt.. I like it hot and my husband likes it cold so having separate controls were awesome. My husband was a little disappointed that the back didn’t have it’s own controls as well and my kids were sad there wasn’t a DVD player. But we loved the radio options. CD, MP3, Sirius, so many preset channels we had plenty to listen to. Oh and I almost forgot all about the back up camera. I didn’t use it much because I have some friends who said they are so used to theirs that it’s hard to drive cars without it. So I spent half my time looking at the camera and the other half looking over my shoulder out of habit. But it’s really a great feature because a little kid could be right behind you and you wouldn’t see them no matter what, but the camera would catch them.
The steering wheel has all the controls for the phone, radio, air built into it. Seems like that is becoming more standard too, or at least it’s in my van.
Keyless start, my husband and I both got used to keeping the key in our pockets in just the one week we were driving the Kia.
The dashboard included an ECO light. We found the ECO light on the dashboard to be a little strange. I mean, it’s great to know when the vehicle is in optimal driving conditions but what can we do to maintain that. I guess it just makes drivers more aware of what speed and consistency to strive for when you can, but traffic is traffic at least that’s what we thought.
The seats were very comfortable quit adjustable. My husband and I both used the set up to save our seat settings so every time we switched all we had to do was hit button one or button two. The Kia Sorento also has convenient accessory power ports for many different electronic devices. Gone are the days when you need adaptors for all of your devices. It’s been a while since I fully reviewed a car like this, if you remember back I told you my husband is all about the cup holders, well you’ll be happy to know there are plenty of built in cup holders in the 2012 Kia Sorento.
I like how the side view mirrors just fold in. We lost one once in a drive by and it would have been great if they would have just folded in instead of what did happen.
Overall, I really enjoyed driving the Kia for a week.
Thank you Kia and STI for allowing us to review the Kia Sorento for a week.
“The world has never seen anything quite like this. A unique combination of class-leading standard horsepower, fuel efficiency and advanced standard features. The Kia Forte Koup. The first of its kind.”
I have never driven a hybrid before so I had no idea what to expect. I turned the key and there was no sound. The lights on the dash came on but that’s it. I was thinking I didn’t turn the car on so I turned the key again. It was still silent. I wasn’t sure what to do. I took the car out of park and we started moving, I guess the car is on I thought to myself. Wow it was scary but really cool at the same time. Every time I stopped at a light or stop sign I still felt like the car was not on. The dashboard was quite distracting at times. All the digital displays. You can see how much power the battery has, how much gas you have, how many miles you have gone what you are getting in miles per gallon and your average miles per gallon. The display is customizable which is a good thing because I would not want my teenager driving with all of that going on. Maybe when they start driving they’ll be used to that much going on at once. We’ll just have to see when that day comes. I’m not looking forward to that day. I know that computers have been running cars for quite a few years now so I’m quite comfortable with all the features it has.
