Car Tips for Road Trips

With the holidays around the corner, chances are that you’re going to be doing some driving – whether to visit family and friends or grab that perfect Christmas tree. Follow these tips to make sure your next road trip is a breeze.

1. Clean your car before and during your trip – Go ahead, leave the napkins and gum wrappers under your seat. A few days into your trip, when the old gum wrappers are joined by new fast food wrappers, when the glove box starts overflowing with hotel receipts and local maps, when dog hair starts sticking to your luggage and your gear, you’ll rue the day you failed to pull out the Shop-Vac. Clean your car before you go for a road trip – you will be happier and able to focus on what’s really important!

2. Check your vehicle – About a week before you leave for a long road trip, have your mechanic check your car’s fluid levels, brakes, tires and anything else that could cause problems. Be sure your spare tire is fully inflated and that you have jumper cables and extra wiper fluid on hand.

3. Get off the highways — but beware the Blue Highways – Unless you have a specific destination and a strict schedule, there is little point in hitting the roads to see the country if you don’t spend some time on the back roads. However, some “blue highways” (as certain back roads were called in the popular book by William Least Heat-Moon) are not much more than endless strip malls. Most U.S. road maps have some indicator of whether a “back road” is an interesting one.

4. Anticipate trouble spots – If you are grinding out long miles on a road trip, it’s not hard to find yourself in the wrong place at the wrong time — like trying to cross the Hudson River at rush hour, or driving the long bridges to Key West on the Friday afternoon of Memorial Day weekend. You’ll want to plan ahead so you cross the Hudson at, say, 10:30 a.m., or blast down to Key West on a Thursday.

5. Join a roadside rescue service – If you take enough road trips, eventually you will end up stranded in without a tow truck in sight. Having that 800-number that immediately ties you in to approved local tow services and mechanics is going to save you a lot of hassle, and also shield you from some of the dangers of the road that none of us wishes to encounter.

JK Volvo is located at 1587 East Walnut in Pasadena. You can reach JK Volvo at (626) 792-2240. You can visit them at www.jkvolvospecialists.com.