midas69

I know it's been done before, but I too just took my first road trip and I've got to say, it's changed my perspective on the TL just a little. My '05 TL only had about 750 miles on it before the trip. We travelled from Chicago to Hilton Head Island, SC. A trip of about 1000 miles each way.

The Navi showed right around 16 hours as the estimated travel time. This was amazingly accurate. Of course it can't take into account time spent refueling and such, nor can it account for exceeding the speed limit. But my old Maxima always seemed to calculate based on 55MPH regardless of the actual speed limits involved.

The Navi was also amazingly easy to follow and accurate. Having had a previous car with Navi I wasn't too surprised by it. But my travelling partner, who has never driven a car with Navi, was totally blown away by it. The last time was took a road trip together was 25 years ago, before Navi and before the Internet. It was a time of old fold up maps.

I don't want to make this all about the Navi, but one other thing came up that I found intereting, the unverified roads. We were travelling to an area that did not have full coverage. I didn't really get a concept of the unverified roads from reading the manual and I'm still not sure I fully understand it. There were a few times when going down the interstate that I saw dotted lines that I thought were the unverified roads. But when I'd punch in a golf course in the area, it would find them off the main drags and tell me the road was unverified. It also found roads in blank areas when I made a wrong turn. I found it all kind of strange but it does make me feel better that there is much more coverage than it would appear.

Now about the rest of the car. Things didn't start out too well. I was really shocked at how small the trunk really is. We were able to fit in 2 sets of clubs, a suitcase, a duffle bag and a laptop bag. But it was a tight fit.

But that was the only downside. Everything else was amazing. As I mentioned, the guy I was travelling with and myself have taken road trips before. It was always a struggle. We'd have to force ourselves to continue driving. This time we almost fought over who got to drive. It was just so enjoyable that we both wanted to drive. Fortunately I owned the keys so I ened up driving about 700 out of the 1000 miles.

It is kind of a dangerous car though. Not unsafe, just dangerous if you want to avoid tickets. We constantly found ourselves pushing close the 100MPH mark without really trying. It would have been fun to push it even higher, but it was amzing how much traffic we ran into. But even at 100MPH, things felt really solid. We never felt even close to being out of control.

We did run into some truly strange weather conditions. It was probably about 2am, it was 5 degrees outside and we had fog. We constantly expected to see black ice, but never did. Or if there was, it didn't have any effect on the TL. I do think we would have been better served with the fog lights mounted lower, but they did help.

The XM was a very nice feature to have on the trip too. It was great being able to travel such a long distance and not have to constanly search for new stations in the area. We only lost reception a few times. There are 2 tunnels we went through and once just driving through the mountains in Tennesse. Overall the reception was a pleasant surprise.

Overall the creature comforts were excellent. The dual zone climate control was a really great feature. It was amazing how comfortable the driver seat is over such a long distance, but it would be nice if there were a few more adjustments available on the passenger seat. Ride quality and especially interior noise levels far exceeded what I expected. We were consistenly running around 80 and it was quiet as a mouse inside. And wow, pitch dark road, no other cars around, man, does that dash look cool!!!

Which brings up another surprise, gas milage. I expected to see numbers close, but under, EPA estimates if we were sticking around 55MPH. But in most cases were were running about 80. According to the MID, reset for each tank of gas, we were getting speed averages of 72 to 77. I would put the average at 74. Now I must admit, I never did the real math to figure it out, but according to the MID, were getting between 26 and 30MPG. I tend to use the cruise control more and I never got less than 28 on a tank.

Unfortunately, all the words in the world can't really quantify the driving experience and I'm not a good enough wordsmith to be able to explain it. I can only say that any second thoughts I had about my purchase were dispelled by this little trip.

mrsteve

iTrader: (1)

Sounds like you guys had a blast.

FYI: on the previous Generation, it has been found that setting the cruise control at 70 MPH so that the engine sits at 2000rpms yields the best gas mileage from these cars.

NOX 3.2

same feeling I had after my 2500 mile trip,
70 - 110 mph
great mileage (29-33 mpg)

great car, feels solid.
exhaust noise is so cool, that you want to turn off the DVD-A/XM and listen to it sometimes...

I'm glad we all agree...

MR1

I wish the rain would go away here in sunny CA so I could put some road miles on mine. Glad the trip went well.