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Our long distance drive is over. We drove from Spokane, WA, to Miami and back. Total mileage was 7483. Our first fillup was in Missoula, MT so that's from where our mileage check started. Total mileage for gas purposes was 7236, total gallonage bought was 123.66, not counting the first benchmark one in Missoula but adding the final fillup 2 miles from home. That gives a mpg of 58.52.

I wanted a 60 mpg overall but we hit a terrible headwind all the way across Oklahoma, the panhandle of Texas and into New Mexico. That 500+ mile drive and tankful resulted in 49.xx mpg which lowered the overall of course. (I didn't think this great car could even GET less than 50 mpg. )

Zero problems with the car of course...hey, it's a Toyota, and for 6 of the 7 days going I was able to plug it in each night. With those miles per day EV is kinda a drop in the bucket but it helped a bit. On the way back I was able to plug in 11 of the 12 days.

Oh, and the two 7 day cruises out of Miami were fantastic weatherwise....apparently between 2 storms. We did hit a bit of rain in Illinois and in North Florida while driving but not too bad.

Overall a great trip ... interior storage for travelling purposes is nowhere as spacious as our previous 2009 but we managed. And we saw Elvis. (Well, at least his grave at Graceland.)

 

Interesting. How did you calculate how many miles per charge I got?

One thing I forgot to mention in my first post....I watched the 10,000 mile "reset" as someone else called it.

I use Trip A for each tankful. I leave "B" alone and this was the one I watched. All it did was leave off the 1 from the mileage column. The Consumption column remained the same and the Average speed remained the same. So to see what the mileage is overall on Trip B we just have to mentally add the first digit from the odometer.

 

Ahhhh, sorry, I should have been clearer. We had gas in the tank when we left home and since I wanted an exact mpg I didn't start our mpg calculations until we had a full tank. Hence full tank in Missoula and starting milage noted at that point.

The overall mpg of 58.52 includes EV miles.

 

Glad you asked.

Our 2009 of course had the space under the rear compartment. Bats in the PiP. So no extra underwear for me. And then the front door panel had a storage space from the front to the back on the 2009. Teeny weeny little storage hole on the front panel of the PiP....just enough for a bottle of water. The center console on the 2009 used to hold my DSLR camera just perfectly...on the PiP my camera won't even fit into it. So my expensive camera just sat on the floor in front of the front seat behind my feet. Ugh, but I like my camera nearby for quick shots. I used to put my cell phone and charger plus my wallet in the center glovey on the 2009. It doesn't even exist on the PiP. The regular glovey on the right side used to have a middle shelf...the PiP doesn't have it. The under the shifter shelf has such small sidewalls it doesn't hold much.

I can't find too much to bitch about on the PiP but the storage, or lack of it, is one area I can bitch about for long drives, and that's what we do in retirement.

 

We always stay in Motel 6's when travelling. Cheap, reasonably clean and the normal ones have the outside doors to the rooms. Hence easy to recharge. The one time we didn't stay in a Motel 6 on the outward trip was in Illinois where the Motel was a franchise and once we paid and looked at the room we requested a refund....too dirty. We went across the street to a Super 8 and this was the one that we couldn't plug in from the room. On the way back one of our stays was in Laughlin, NV at the Colorado Belle and we weren't able to plug in at that casino/hotel.

Whine coming up....

Motel 6 now has Corp motels (those that return more profit) and franchised out the lesser returning ones. Mostly owned by a, let's just say, different culture than our American one. The franchises aren't required to adhere to the same rules or standards of cleanliness. We now always phone ahead and ask if it's franchise owned or corp owned. As of this trip we won't stay at franchised owned ones.

 

We were able to park in front of the room usually...the motels were not too busy in Oct. With some rooms I was able to just use the OEM cord only ... a few I did have to use my extension cord. I also took the little wire thingy I use at home which the heavy plug in piece hangs from. I would put this wire onto the bracket on the upper floor walkway and hang either cord from it to keep it off the walkway in front of our room. While at a casino/hotel in Jackpot, NV, I used the RV parking lot for 3 hours. And I ususally just kept the door open, sometimes just the wire width open, other times all the way open. Ah, to live where it's warm.

At each motel I'd ask the clerk if I could plug my car in for a few hours....lol. Most clerks just stared at me and said sure. Only one ever asked, "Do you have a hybrid car?" then went on to say she'd looked at them then decided she couldn't afford one.

 

Do you mean the 10,000 mile one? If so I had everything done early mileage wise, before I left. They said they'd put it down in the computer as the 10,000 mile one. I'm going to do a 15,000 mile oil change and tire rotation myself so it'll be back on schedule for the 20,000 mile one.

 

Thanks. It was a good trip. Like all trips, it's sad it's over and I shudder to think of the next 5 or 6 months of cold snowy weather.

Next trip is a cruise to Hawaii out of L.A. in January/13 so that'll break up the winter a bit. It'll be a fun drive getting out of our area in the middle of winter. I HATE having to drive long distance with the studded snow tires on just to get out of Eastern WA, then the rest of the way is mileage loss with the heavy steel wheels and crappy rolling resistance tires.

 

Yep. It's very similar to the 2009 I think. do not know the exact dimension difference but we never noticed much change. I'm 6 foot and 200 lbs of pure blubber so the cushioning may help.