Have your auto service technician perform a vehicle inspection to make sure the car is good to go for a road trip… what could be worse than being stranded on the side of the road with your kids screaming in the back seat?
Don’t leave this to the last minute. Make sure your technician has availability in his or her schedule to properly check your car and perform any necessary repairs. It’s not a good idea to get any major repairs done days before you leave town — if there are unexpected delays (like bolts seizing, unavailable parts, etc.) this could really throw a wrench in your schedule (pardon the pun). If there are any warranty issues after the repair, you want to have them addressed while you’re in town and not find out while you’re on the highway in the middle of nowhere.
Do-it-yourself items like checking fluid levels and tire pressures should be done. Don’t forget to check the tire pressure in your spare tire! Don’t go by the maximum tire pressure written on the tires themselves. Instead, remember that tire pressures for your car are written on a placard in the driver’s side door jamb and/or in the fuel door.
Check your light bulbs and wiper blades too — many owners’ manuals have instructions on how to replace these items.
Kids can help out too during this prep time; why not make it a family affair? They can check fluid levels and light bulbs with you, older kids can check tire pressures too.
Sometimes travelling with the family means I have to play a bit of Tetris with all our gear. The strategy is to help free up space inside the passenger cabin so it’s a more comfortable ride and fewer loose items are hanging around.
When there’s not enough room in our SUV, we use a Thule cargo box that hooks up to our car’s hitch. If you don’t have a hitch for that option, consider using a rooftop carrier.
Remember to bring your car emergency kit (filled with energy bars, water, blankets, wind-up flashlight, etc.) just in case.
Remember to keep loose items secured. If you have anything tied down or tethered, check them every time you get to a pit stop. Make sure your windows are clear (including your rear windshield) and your mirrors are unobstructed. If you have a cargo mat that covers the contents of your trunk, that's a good guideline of how high you can safely pile up your luggage.
I know it seems like all this shouldn’t need to be said but I’m sure you’ve passed one or two vehicles on the road that have stuff piled so high in their car, you wonder how the driver can see properly.
The 2013 Chevrolet Trax is GM's newest crossover type vehicle. I'm not normally a huge fan of crossovers — my personal preference is either a sedan or an SUV... but the Trax had me reconsidering.
Here are some key features that made my life easier:
MyLink
The Trax's entertainment system called MyLink is basically an extension of your smartphone. It connects to your phone and plays music, shows pictures and makes hands-free phone calls possible. It's a much more cost-effective way of having a great entertainment system since the technology in the dashboard unit is pretty basic. It's all being driven by your smartphone! The MyLink system also minimizes costs as it comes without a CD player. It worked out for me because most of my music is on my phone anyway.
Now you can have navigation without paying for the cost of the system. Since MyLink is an extension of your smartphone, you can download BringGo as a GPS app for your phone and have it display on the MyLink screen.
Under the Hood
Super easy layout of the fluid reservoirs that you would need to check regularly (such as coolant, washer fluid and brake fluid), as well as easy access to the engine oil level indicator (that's the technical term for 'dipstick'). The battery terminals are easily accessible in case you need to jump start the car. The air filter is up top too in case you wanted to replace that on your own. So overall, although the engine compartment is quite compact, it's well laid out for do-it-yourself maintenance for the average driver.
Child car seat
The back row's seating is quite flat which makes it easy to get the right angle when installing a rear-facing child car seat. The headrests also come right off — which is handy when tethering a forward-facing child car seat. There is a bit of cushioning in the seat though so you have to make sure you put a good amount of weight on the child seat when tightening up the straps during the seat installation.
Storage
There were compartments galore in the Chevy Trax — I love it! It was perfect, I had a place to store anything that I needed while driving. Very helpful when trying to keep the car tidy and organized. Compartments were located in the usual spaces — glovebox, armrest, door panel...and there were many more available in the dash. Loved it, loved it.
Uber Cool — TuneIn Radio
The Trax's MyLink is compatible with TuneIn Radio — a free app that allows you to listen to live radio from around the world! So even if you're driving to the States for that much needed shopping trip, you can listen to your fave local radio station. People like my parents, for example, will love this feature because they can listen to live radio from 'back home'... Hong Kong, in my parents' case.
As always with GM products, the Trax's owners manual was detailed and informative. Lots of information about car safety and do-it-yourself maintenance. I personally didn't like the digital speedometer, I much prefer an analog gauge. But my mom loved it... for her, the digital reading was so convenient. To each his own, I suppose. Lastly, the coolant temp gauge is absent from the instrument cluster — no biggie for those of you who don't look at that anyway... but as a technician, I like my gauges! The 2013 Chevrolet Trax starts at $18,495.
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