Took the STI on a road trip to Virginia (near DC) to visit family over four days and just got back last night. Went down with my mom, aunt (both in their mid 60s), my brother and my 7 yr old son. My brother flew back on his own as he had to be back earlier so we had one less passenger on the way back but that also meant I was the solo driver. Trip was about 1000km one way. Left last Friday around 4pm and arrived 3:30am. Left Virginia yesterday around 6:30am, and after dropping off my mom and aunt, got home around 7:45pm. This included a 2hr stop for lunch/outlet shopping.
Prior to the trip, I checked the weather forecast along our route. I was especially concerned about the mountains in Pennsylvania dropping down to near freezing so decided to switch to winters before heading out. This was a good decision as we experienced rain and freezing snow on our trip back.
The STI did a great job. Plenty of room in the trunk for all our stuff and we were all comfortable inside. No complaints about road harshness or noise. My mom even commented on how the car felt very stable.
A bit of a scare on the way down though. We had seen a few deer dead on the side of the highway when all of a sudden, there was a carcass in the middle of our lane. It looked like it was just hit as there were plenty of body parts blown about. I didn't have enough time to go around it and was afraid to go over it with my tires at over 100km/h so I ended going over it getting the carcass between the tires. Felt the contact under the car but wasn't bad. Then we see a car pulled over, may have been the one that hit the deer in the first place. Sorry, but I wasn't going to pull over on a dark highway in the middle of the night in the middle of no where. Anyway, at the next gas stop, I inspected the underside. Thankfully, no damage, even the front bumper. Just plenty of deer blood and meat on the plastic under covers, mudguards, etc.
Saw plenty more deer carcasses the rest of the way and we were extra vigilant after that incident. The rest were off to the side of the road though.
Fuel economy for the trip was a little less than 11l/100km. I've done short highway trips were the STI has gone below 10l/100km. I'm guessing the extra weight and the mountain climbs were the cause of the lower economy. Bumper to bumper traffic around the GTA also didn't help.
