Grey Audi Q7 Rental in Los Angeles

A mid metallic grey is the right weight of colour for a car this large. White makes a full-size SUV look like a fleet vehicle and black makes it look heavy; grey keeps the long flank and the blistered arches legible without either. On the Q7, whose shape is deliberately restrained, it is the finish the design was drawn for.

It is a practical choice for the work this car does. Grey does not glare on a long freeway day, does not show the dust a canyon or a beach car park leaves, and looks equally correct at a hotel entrance and outside a house. Take it when the week involves moving people and you would rather the car were competent than conspicuous.

The Q7 is the Audi for people who actually need seven seats and do not want to arrive in something that looks like a shuttle. The third row folds flat into the floor and rises electrically, so most of the week it is a very large five-seat SUV with an enormous boot, and on the day you need it, it carries seven.

What sets it apart on a long day is refinement. Air suspension smooths out the patched surfaces on the 10, wind noise is unusually well suppressed at freeway speed, and quattro all-wheel drive makes it completely unbothered by a wet morning on the coast road. The cabin is the part Audi has always done best — quiet, solid and free of the fussiness that makes big SUVs tiring.

Honest hook: with all seven seats up, boot space is modest. If you are collecting seven people and seven suitcases from LAX, the Cadillac Escalade ESV in the fleet is the car for that and this one is not.