The Toyota Land Cruiser, one of the oldest names in the automobile business, is on the lower end of sales numbers these days, yet retains strong loyalty from a devoted group of consumers.

Weighing in at almost 6,000 pounds and standing more than 6 feet tall, a black-clad 2017 model cast an imposing presence among other SUVs and pickups recently in the parking lot of the Pepper Pod restaurant at Hudson.

It provided Jan and me a nice, comfortable ride, fairly soft with an occasional bit of pitch and float. The Land Cruiser uses an independent double-wishbone front suspension with coil springs and stabilizer bar, and four-link rear suspension with coils, stabilizer bar and semifloating axle.

Regarding the Pepper Pod, I loved this eating place as a kid from Wray and Sterling for its pen of buffalo out back. In recent years, in our stops, I’ve enjoyed talking cars with Bill Schmidt, an employe there for 28 years. It seems he’s always there, and ready to talk of whatever new car I’ve driven or a recollection of a favorite car from his past. He’s actually worked that corner of town for 49 years, having started as a teenager at a Conoco station, then after 21 years walking next door for the waiter’s job at the Pod.

The new Land Cruiser is filled with innovation, from its 8-speed automatic transmission to its lane-departure alert/blind-spot monitor and to its navigation setup. A multiterrain monitor displays front, rear and side camera views on the navigation screen.

It remains, though, an old-style SUV, evidenced by the fact its third-row seats, rather than tumble into the floor, are folded up at each side of the rear cargo area, diminishing precious cargo space. As I looked at those folded-up seats pushed to the side kind of like jump seats in old Land Rovers, I expected maybe to see a pith helmet tossed to one side or the other.

The Land Cruiser, built in Aichi, Japan, is a solid performer with its 5.7-liter V-8 engine of 381 horsepower and 401 lb.-ft. of torque. Its EPA estimate is only 13 to 18 miles per gallon; my overall average was 15.3.

In offroading, move the 4WD dial to 4Lo and twist the crawl-mode control and it will slowly move over or around most any ground obstacle, even give an inclinometer (angles of slope) reading.

With its three rows of seats, the Land Cruiser is considered an eight-passenger vehicle.

It’s pricey; the sticker on the new one I drove is $86,722.

Twenty years ago, the Land Cruiser sold 12,000 to 15,000 vehicles per year in the U.S. Ten years later, the sales figure had dropped into the 3,000 range and has hovered around that since. Last year, the total was 3,705, a slight increase from 2015.