Lucie Loves... Cars // Kia Stinger Test-Drive in Cornwall, Lunch at Rick Stein's, Bovey Castle & my Zhen Reiss dress!
Do you fancy a trip to Cornwall? Pack your virtual bags and join me vicariously, as I zip along Cornish roads in the all-new Kia Stinger GT S with fellow vlogger Just a uniform!
I can't help but get excited when a press trip opportunity like this lands in my inbox. Kia really know how to treat a lady – especially when it comes to playing the host!
On Monday evening, I packed my bags and made my way to Gatwick Airprt's Hilton Hotel. We'd been put up overnight, ready to feel fresh for our early morning flight to Cornwall the next day. Determined not to sleep through my alarm this time and/or miss my flight, I think I slept with one eye open all night!
After a rapid pancake breakfast at the hotel restaurant, I joined Kia's Sara Robinson and the others, and made our way to catch the flight. I had the utter pleasure of traveling with fellow Northerner, blogger/vlogger Siobhan aka Just a Uniform, Renata Fernandes, Curtis Moldrich, Ben Griffin, and Craig Hammond. Our itinerary was tightly packed, but fortunately, still left time for a few surprises to be thrown in too!
On arrival at Newquay Airport, we hopped off the plane, straight onto a Stinger-emblazoned bus and pitched up at the VIP lounge – all laid out with coffee and bacon butties!
As we trundled along the runway, I could hear some announcement on the bus's speaker system... something about an emergency landing?! Shit! What do we do? Why is nobody panicking?!
Suddenly, to our right, we saw three cherry red Kia Stingers speeding along the runway at full pelt! Where better to test out all 365 bhp than on the same tarmac that planes take off on! Like a trio of red arrows, they looked rather majestic as they zoomed past us! It was quite the emergency landing, and the second time this year that I've felt like I was in an episode of Top Gear.
After grabbing a snack and a steaming cup of Yorkshire Tea in the VIP lounge, we split into teams of two (I bagsied Siobhan, obvs) collected our keys for the Stinger, and were instructed to get to Rick Stein's The Seafood Restaurant in Padstow for our 12:30pm lunch reservation.
Team Girls are go!
We arrived at Rick Stein's bang on time! There's a small, but busy, car park out the front for patrons to park in. The menu is vast! It took us all a while to decide what to eat. In the end, I ordered the seared octopus to start and the lobster for my main. Thought it wise to fill my belly ahead of me taking over the driving ;-)
After lunch, we tried to find some picturesque places to stop and shoot some photos on our drive back to Bovey Castle, but the time was too tight and the weather too ominous to get the shots we were after. But we did make a friend...
Take a peek at my vlog to see how we got on testing out the Stinger's many luxurious features, our lobster at lunch at Rick Stein's, the sumptuous spa treatments at Bovey Castle and my outfit shoot wearing the Maraschino red Reiss Zhen burnout-detail midi dress. In a quest to pack "light" I'd forgotten my hairbrush or GHD hair straighteners. Damn! So... the touseled-looking hair that you can see in the shots is my natural waves. I'm just going to pretend that I'm channeling some sort of 40s starlet! It goes nicely with the dress. After all, I love a bit of glamour, when I not dressed in my dungarees...
Thank you to Siobhan for taking the photos of me and this very sexy car! The test-drive trip with Kia was a window into the lifestyle that a potential Stinger owner could hope to enjoy. If I was buying one... it would have to be in red. It'd the perfect road trip car, all rear-wheel drive and raring to go!
Photography © Lucie Kerley