Since we’ve got three girls (ages 8-4), we decided about five years ago to bump up our vehicle size to a third-row SUV and bought a brand new Subaru Ascent Touring edition. We ran it all over, beach to the mountains, and remote campsites in between.
Two years ago my wife hit a whitetail doe on the way to drop the kids off at school/daycare and we lost it to a vehicle fire (which Subaru said was “totally fine, you walked away, the vehicle was functioning as intended when the accident happened, we’ll give you $2k towards a new one…”). Wife and girls (and our new puppy) all got out safely, which I guess Subaru gets to add to their “they survived” statistic.
Needing a quick replacement, we ended up with a 2019 Audi Q7. While it had some technology quirks, we liked it well enough. It’s the vehicle we were driving when we “escaped” from Ashville, NC after the hurricane hit. It handled some “roads” that I would swear were coyote trails between Mexico and Arizona. Ironically one of the roads we used to get home from that trip was the “Tail of the Dragon,” and I got this picture. “Have tomahawk, will travel.”
Late last year we upgraded to a 2024 Q7 55 TFSI Quattro. The V6 upgrade has been super nice in the mountains and getting around big and/or slow vehicles on the interstate. It came with the tow package already installed (7,000lb) and we added roof racks. Can’t wait to take it camping come spring.
