Been told these are the 3 in the class I’ve booked, and that if I call ahead, I might be able to register a choice.

Read a few reviews, and they all seem to be genuinely capable off road, not so hot on road.

Any thoughts? Experience? Hints, tips, facts or rumours?

Are there some which have 2×4 models i meight end up with? Or any which definitely only come in 4×4? That might swing it.

Cheers!

Are you intending to take them off road or not?

I’ve only ever seen any of these from the exterior but of those I’d discount the Pathfinder unless you need a massive car; it’s massive compared to the others.

Jeep would probably be my preference just because it’s slightly smaller.

I wouldn’t go anywhere in a Jeep. I’d always choose a non-US car if I could.

If it’s normal car hire, I’d be amazed if you are allowed to take them off-road btw.

Def off-road. Dirt tracks in national parks. eg: Cathedral Valley looks amazing, but access is 60 mile dirt track loop. Read about people turning back because they didn’t have the clearance. Chopped in the Mustang convertible as a result! It’s going to be chilly anyway.

If it’s normal car hire, I’d be amazed if you are allowed to take them off-road btw

What they don’t know can’t hurt them

Until you prang it, they ask you how, and they bill you for the repairs and/or the whole car.

You do NOT want to mess with these people. You really don’t.

I guess dirt roads are not off-road as such, but you may wish to clarify. I would fully expect there to be a no dirt road clause in their contracts, or at least a no non-graded dirt road clause.

Just googled it, it seems the companies vary a lot. Check the small print, and ask when you hire.

Oh and don’t do it lightly. You are in the desert, and you may well not have a phone signal. If you are using a UK phone on AT&T you almost certainly won’t. In fact you definitely won’t out in the sticks. When I’ve been out there I went all day without even any AM radio signal. Nothing but static across the dial, it’s pretty freaky actually.

You are on your own, your car could break down (esp if it’s a Jeep 🙂 ) you could get stuck or worse, so you need loads of water and food etc. Maybe investigate one of those satellite locator thingies – useful for general outdoor use of course too.

You’re far too risk averse molly 🙂

just lie if you have to

Lie? Of course, that’s guaranteed to be fine! No worries!

I’ll have a good look through all the gubbins. Seen already the insurance doesn’t cover damage to undercarriage, so I’m taking the main risk from going off road on the chin anyway.

I’d rather read all the crap than ask the desk jockey. They might not know for sure, they’re likely to be conservative if they don’t, and once they’ve told you, they’ve told you. And I don’t want them to say no! 🙂

Thanks mol, good reality check about the scale of the place and the lack of bail-out options. I will certainly bear it in mind when making plans and use appropriate (I hope) caution.

If it’s normal car hire, I’d be amazed if you are allowed to take them off-road btw.

Have you ever been to US countryside?

Pretty damn hard to get anywhere worthwhile without some dirt tracks.

We did some minor offroading in Moab and California and it was ace.
Having said which the offroading we did in California was either in a 4 door saloon or a van, both seemed to cope ok. We spent a while trying to see if there was a speed at which the car started to glide over the washboarding rather than bumping along…. it may exist but if so then it’s above 50mph 🙂

The main thing is to not get conned on the insurance. They’ll give you all sorts of horror stories about what extra cover you need. Complete bovex, we rejected it all and they didn’t bat an eyelid when we returned the minivan with a boulder sized dent in the rear wing after the missus reversed it into a rock in Joshua Tree.

This one for luxury etc Toyota Highlander.

In other part of the world they called it Toyota Landcruiser Super King. i.e. plenty on the road for obvious reasons.

The rest just eat dust … 😆

chewkw. Not sure if we’re looking at the same Highlander. The one I’m looking at seems to be lower/mid range of Toyota’s line-up. eg starting price of $28k compared to $78k for the Landcruiser. ?

Cool, cheers thegeneralist, nicely encouraging!

Erring towards the Jeep, cautiously. Don’t need 7 seats, they’re all scored down on reliability in tests. From what I’ve read, Alamo at Las Vegas take you to the car park for your category and you take your pick, so I might just wait till we get there.

nedrapier – Member

chewkw. Not sure if we’re looking at the same Highlander. The one I’m looking at seems to be lower/mid range of Toyota’s line-up. eg starting price of $28k compared to $78k for the Landcruiser. ?

Pic?

This is Super King … V8 engine. (largest of the Landcruiser)
Info here.

This is Prado king … king this and king that … hmmm … 3.0 litre turbo. (medium size)
Info here.

Either one of the above will still leave competitor eating dust … 😆

But this is the over engineered daddy … the best and built like a tank. 4.2 litre turbo VX Limited. (large or similar to the first one in size)
This is what I want.
Info here.

This is the updated version of FJ45 of FJ40 … now called FJ Cruiser. Slightly smaller than the medium one above)

This is a bit small and the rear a bit tight but it comes with suicide doors …

Oh ya … others eat the dust from all the above … 😆

p/s: then you get the hairdresser version (small size …) Toyota RAV4.

thanks for the time and the pics!

I’d have no worries with a Landcruiser, I know they’ve got a great reputation. But the Highlander is a few rungs below.

http://www.toyota.com/ Hover over “Crossovers & SUVs” and you’ll see the Highlander, much closer to the RAV4 than the Landcruiser.

Have you ever been to US countryside?

Pretty damn hard to get anywhere worthwhile without some dirt tracks.

I’d bet a small amount of money (but no more) that I’ve been to more of it than you 🙂

Dirt tracks would sometimes be considered roads and sometimes not. Hence the wording of rental agreements.

The main thing is to not get conned on the insurance. They’ll give you all sorts of horror stories about what extra cover you need. Complete bovex

It’s not rubbish at all. Typically, the insurance policies people have on their own cars provide fully comp on any car they drive including hire cars, which is why it’s not included in the minimum insurance. Hiring a car with most US credit cards also provides insurance to those who don’t have their own policies. However foreigners don’t have this insurance hence the collision damage waiver aka CDW. If you don’t get it, you are under-insured. If you write it off, you’ll have to pay.

http://www.insurance4carhire.co.uk will sell you CDW for £99 per year flat rate, which is well worth it and can save you a mint.

nedrapier – Member

http://www.toyota.com/ Hover over “Crossovers & SUVs” and you’ll see the Highlander, much closer to the RAV4 than the Landcruiser.

D’oh! They keep changing names … arrghhh …In that case get the proper Landcruiser Prado. Don’t go for anything smaller then FJ.

Or VX Limited and this is the best of them lot even with older version.

😀

We had the jeep suv in the states, nice drive spacious for 5 and does great handbrake turns and outruns patrol cars at midnight leaving disney !

I’d look at the Jeep, a friend of mine swears by them and does a huge amount of road miles, they are very car like and comfortable. I’d consider buying one, but they’re too nice to be a bike lugging vehicle.
I guess that the three on offer are all going to do the job you want, or they wouldn’t be on offer and the terrain is more than likely going to be fireroadlike (that’s the impression I get from the movies I’ve seen).

Apparently, my rental includes:

Appropriate local sales taxes at the appropriate rate(s) in
force.
* Airport Surcharge for rentals commencing at an airport
location.
* Unlimited mileage and fire insurance.
* Liability Insurance for injuries or damages to persons or
things outside the vehicle.
* Rental includes Collision Damage Waiver and Theft
protection for the vehicle with Zero excess therefore client
should not purchase any additional insurance at time of pick
up.
* Includes 3 additional drivers and one tank of fuel.

Doesn’t mention rescue from remote dirt roads, or whether non-vehichle collisions are covered (eg roof with ground!) so I’ll be careful…

Cheers David, I’ve just taken another step towards the jeep.

If it’s an American road trip surely it’s got to be the Jeep.

Toyota is gaining popularity in USA …

I once decided to cut out a 200 mile loop of road by going on a 40 mile dirt road. We enquired locally as to the condition of the road, like you’re supposed do, and they said we should be ok.. fair enough. We were driving a Hyundai Accent, and things were fine at first. Nice wide smooth gravelly road.

Well after a while the nicely maintained bit turned off and we ended up on a track which got worse and worse. We got to a stream crossing where we had to go down into a gulley and back out. Think of a muddy green lane from the UK that’s been trashed by off-roaders, but steep up and down. The mud had baked hard so I drove with one wheel between the wheel ruts and one on the side of the track. If I’d slipped into the wheel ruts our small car would’ve been completely beached and we’d have been stuck in the desert. A rain shower would’ve had the same effect. Coming out of the gulley it was so steep the car started to bog down. Fortunately, it turned out the L setting on the gearbox was actually a lower gear, so managed to carry on…

Now I know how chav joyriders feel trying to get a Vauxhall Corsa up a Welsh mountain. Except we didn’t set fire to the car afterwards.

my wife has had Highlanders for the past 6 years and just got a new one. Absolutely great car. It has all-wheel drive, but don’t think I would want to take it on any real “off-road” situation due to clearance (we use my Tacoma for that kind of fun). Great highway car and very reliable. Her earlier one had 5 years on it and never a single mechanical issue.

Molgrips: I’d bet a small amount of money (but no more) that I’ve been to more of it than you

Almost definitely true. Which suggests that you’ll have also driven on more dirt tracks than me. Bear in mind that since this is a MTB forum I’m assuming that the OP is doing something more than sightseeing. All the following trips I did necessitated driving down dirt tracks: Finding the put in to kayak the main section of the Tuolomne River; getting to the Upper Kaweha River; getting to Peabody Boulders and various other climbing venues in Bishop; getting round Red Rocks and Joshua Tree; getting to the start of the Slickrock Trail and Porcupine Rim in Moab.

We spent about 3 hours at SFO airport arguing with the car hire guy about insurance. He insisted that if we didn’t upgrade our insurance to the full monty then we’d be utterly shafted if we had an accident. We stood firm and refused to waste the extra money. It took literally hours to argue with him.
3 weeks later we crashed the car into a boulder and put a big dent in it. They weren’t remotely bothered and we paid nothing extra.

So – As has been stated above off-road in the USA means different to “off-road” in the UK. This…is a “road” about 2 hours from Calgary in Canada. And as Molgrips has already mentioned if you break down there the AA aren’t going to come and help you. Treat it with respect.

Ghost Wilderness – May Long weekend by Mark and Liz in Canada, on Flickr

Ghost Wilderness – May Long weekend by Mark and Liz in Canada, on Flickr

Having said that a friend of mine got a Honda Civic almost to the end and I’m constantly amazed by how far friends get their vehicles.. I’d suspect that all 3 of your choices would be fine for dirt tracks or simmilar unless you have experience of off-road driving in the UK and are really intending to take them off-road (in the North American sense)

As an aside the FJ cruiser is very uncomfortable in the back…

That’s much more of a road than the bit I mentioned above. Let me see if I can figure out where it was.

I always hire an american car (except for when I hire an american motorcycle 😈 ) in the States; so what if its not as good/economical/refined? Its as big a part of the experience as the breakfasts for me. Jeep, every time. disappointed that you had to ask!!

American cars. Romantic idea, not so much in practice, imo.

Last one I had the driver’s seat wasn’t bolted in straight. 2000 miles with my head slightly turned to the left was bloody annoying.

Romantic idea, not so much in practice, imo

Depends on what you get/what you spend. The Harley that we hired for our honeymoon was immaculate, sounded amazing with its vance and hines pipe, and provided the soundtrack and backstory to the singulary most romantic and enjoyable holiday of my life. A BMW or a Japanese bike wouldn’t have cut the mustard.
The Mustang we hired last time was great fun, and stunning to look at. (Getting pulled by the highway patrol was less fun, but provided a good story for later; apparently they really don’t like it when you try to get out of the car to meet them…)
Next time we’ll get a convertible mustang, they are become much more reasonably priced to hire.

I own a pathfinder and its a proper body on frame for off roading it isn’t very big at all and is dwarfed at the lights by the North American stuff, the Jeep is extremely capable also and would be my choice for a rental, the Highlander is just a cross over shopping cart and has nothing to do with any landcruiser and is certainly not in the same breed

Done about 1500 miles in the jeep grand cherokee suv and it was very comfortable, handled well and had all the extras you needed, had a dodge grand caravan done 4000 miles across the states and canada not a patch on the suv completely different driving style, but the minivan had more room to move round, ,i think it depends on where you are going and distance travelled

and its a proper body on frame for off roading

Which is interesting, seeing as it’s not very good at that – very poor clearance and approach / ramp over / departure angles

– very poor clearance and approach / ramp over / departure angles

Not commenting on the pathfinders relative ability, I haven’t driven one in anger. But these figure only tell a small part of the story, off road wise. Suspension compliance, tyre choice, power/ratios available and the ability of the driver are all more important than whether bits of bodywork may come into contact with the ground in certain situations.

Drove a baby bronco around normal and dirt roads around BC and then traded for Chrysler Grand Voyager (because the bronco was rubbish really)from Kamloops to Phoenix lots of dirt roads never had any problems with either including the FWD Voyager. We bought these and had the correct insurance so any damage only relevant to resale.

On another earlier trip we also drove a chevy camaro SS through death valley from Mammoth/Bishop to Las Vegas on dirt roads a bit drifty but fine and 50mph+ does get rid of the washboard effect. My friend was driving a small subaru (smaller than impreza) down same roads no bother. The camaro was a hire car and we didn’t really think about it.

I don’t think the dirt/gravel roads you’re talking about really require a full on 4×4 unless you’re going ‘backcountry’ exploring. Just get the one you like the look of or the one that has that BIG V8 noise.

Not commenting on the pathfinders relative ability, I haven’t driven one in anger. But these figure only tell a small part of the story, off road wise. Suspension compliance, tyre choice, power/ratios available and the ability of the driver are all more important than whether bits of bodywork may come into contact with the ground in certain situations.

None of that’s any use if you’re beached – the bits of bodywork in question may well include diffs, the radiator, and the fuel tank – not really what you want losing a battle with a rock / the vehicle’s own weight. FWIW, it has very poor suspension travel compared to most other 4wds. Sure, driver skill comes into it, but the same skilled driver will get further in just about any other 4wd.

None of that’s any use if you’re beached

Obviously. Which is where driver skill and power come in… 😈