Hi All,

Can anyone recommend a US based car (and rental company) to carry: four people, two bike bags and two decent size bags (circa 100 litres)?

Trying to work out feasibility of taking the above over to the US and then up to the accommodation. It is too far to take public transport/Uber (circa 3 hr 30 min drive).

I also don’t know how I am going to get the same delivered to Heathrow from where I live, in a Volvo XC60…but that is another problem.

All the majors are decent over there Hertz/Thrifty/Budget etc.

For that amount of stuff you are looking at a people carrier type thing really, big question is how big are the back seat passengers and who’s going to complain the most 😉

Just get 2 cars.

good point, don’t discount the one way options, plenty of US places have drop off points

I used Holiday Autos (and also used them when I went to Oz last year). They get best prices and you just rent locally from whoever comes out top (Hertz, Thrifty etc). I’ve found them to be really good and also get a pretty decent Quidco cashback too.

In LAX I was just directed into the lot and told to choose whatever I wanted in the category I had paid for – I ended up with a Dodge Grand Caravan (7 seater) and it was cavernous inside especially with the back row of seats folded down.

We booked with Avis (I like the branded rentals at the airport, some of the sneaky ‘cheaper’ buggers of quite a way off site). I handled two bike bags and two people to a mid-size SUV which turned out to be a RAV4.

I’m not sure I would’ve got 4 people in but may have done if I stood the bags up.

Next SUV size up.

SFO / LAS

I’ve used Avis around 5 times in the states – always been great and efficient and no messing with extra insurance/drivers etc.

a 7 seat SUV (US) or a 7\8 seat people carrier will easily do the job (honda oddessey or equivilent).

from an xc60 perspective, I can get my bike in bag upright in the back of one of those (which I’d rented in the US) – you could potentially squeeze 2 down the split ‘1’ seat in the back and get 4 of you in, but it’d be tight

Mini van.
A Dodge caravan with stow and go will almost certainly do the job and cheaper than a suv too.
We did a trip to Sedona. Rented bikes there but the caravan swallowed 5 adults, riding gear and 5 bikes with the front wheels off if we had to drive anywhere.
Bikes were in the ‘middle row’ but with 4 people you can keep the bikes out back.

Thanks Slab. I am going to give it a dry run (packing everything in out own car). We do have the option of putting some luggage in a roof box or something on roof bars on the way to the airport, but the bike bags are going to be the awkward buggers I am guessing.

One thing I did not mention is the place we are staying has (unusually for the US) a small(ish) garage. So the dimensions are 78in/198cm wide by 199in/505cm long. I don’t think that would be classed as small here in the UK, but some of the minivans and larger SUVs won’t fit. Apparently an Audi Q7 sized car does though.

Garage sounds perfect for the bikes 😉

Does your destination have a hire car office?

Iirc A dodge caravan might be a bit tight, I think we had to have the middle seats down (these are two separate seats)to get the bike bags in ours so you may be limited to three people and Bike bags

We went last year with 4 people and 3 bikes – ended up renting a Chevy Suburban, which is the biggest SUV you can get I think. We could fit the bike bags in stood up in the boot length ways. Anything smaller we would have seriously struggled. Previously we’ve used a Chevy Tahoe (Ford Expedition) and that would have been too small – it essentially the same car but with a shorter boot.

The American SUV’s are huge on the outside but not actually that big on the inside.

You’ve only got 2 bikes – so you may be able to get away with smaller.

You can get the boot dimensions on the internet of the various cars and then check if the bike bags fit.