I put the Toyota Sienna minivan to the test and it did not disappoint

Toyota Sienna

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles is currently outselling both Honda and Toyota when it comes to minivans, but for a lot of families, the minivan question still boils down to a choice between two people-haulers: the Honda Odyssey and the Toyota Sienna.

The Odyssey has been around longer, since 1994, and we already took a closer look at this still-impressive vehicle in its most recent iteration, Honda's fifth generation, which is built in Alabama.

The Sienna arrived in 1997 and is now in its third generation, which means that the Indiana-made vehicle is getting long in the tooth, although it has seen many tweaks since 2011. A fourth-gen is expected soon.

I'm in the ideal position to test out minivans, as I have a marketing-sweet-spot family of five (plus a recently added dog). My kids all have friends. And gear.

Over the course of a few days, I threw many challenges at the Sienna, a well-optioned, $41,700 SE Premium trim (the base model is about $30,000).

And I do mean many: a round-trip to pickup four kids from camp, plus all their equipment, as well as a jaunt to a lakefront hideaway with two kids and an extra adult. In between, I threw in some trips to Home Depot and the grocery store.

I came away with an extremely accurate sense of what the Sienna does well — and what it doesn't.