Forrester, Escape, CRV owners

[withm]

Well it's official. My car died while I was on a trip, and I was faced with buying a new engine, wiich would have cost more than the car was worth and taken 2-3 more days than I had time to wait around for a repair, or buy a new car.

I ended up buying a (used) 2008 Escape. The choices available were slim, and trying to buy a car way-out-of-state is more complicated than I would have ever imagined. It's bad enough to be forced to buy a car when you don't have the luxury of shopping around, but there was a time deadline thrown into this mix as well. Ugh!

This Escape is loaded - all the bells and whistles, including 4-wheel drive, which is the last feature I would have normally volunteered to spend money on. What am I going to do with that? Pray for snow????? HA! But I'll still have to put a new kayak rack on top.

Warning: If you have a locking rack system for your car, be sure to bring the keys with you when you go on a trip. I had to sacrifice my kayak rack when my old car went to become an organ donor because not only did I not have the keys with me on this trip, I don't even have a clue as to where they might be.

So I've driven it about 15 miles now, and will drive 800 miles in a couple of days.

I was really leaning towards the Forrester, but the nearest Subaru dealer to where I am is 60 miles away, and when I get home the dealer is still about 45 miles from my home. Hard to go car shopping when you don't have a car. And yes, I cold have ridden my bike over to the local Ford dealer, but I also wanted to be taken seriously when I got there to negotiate a car. This is a town that does not take too kindly to cyclists.....

For what it's worth I also tried a Chevy Equinox. The seats did not even come close to folding down flat - and crazy as it may seem, that was a deal breaker for me. It does have a larger cargo area, but there were just too many things I did not like about the car to pursue it, not to mention the color .

Anyway, thanks for all your comments. It did help a lot. I have not tried to put the bike inside yet, but will trust that it can be done, will try it tomorrow just to be sure.