The author has driven countless models of vehicles having a background in the valet business. However, vehicles that can accommodate a large family on a long road trip are few and far between. The 2010 Chrysler Town and Country minivan does a nice job. It has seating for seven passengers, plenty of versatile cargo room, and a feature set that makes it a great vehicle for road trips. Please note that this is not a comparative review, the author not having driven any other 2010 minivan to date.
The Touring Model
Chrysler's web page for the 2010 Town and Country shows four models: LX, Touring, Touring Customer Preferred Package 2DL, and Walter P. Chrysler Signature Series. This article is about the Touring model, which is a vast improvement over the LX model, but lacks some of the features of the other two models (at a significant cost savings).
The Town and Country Touring sports a 3.6 liter V6 that produces 197 peak horsepower. For those of you who don't know or care what that is, suffice it to say it's not quite "sporty" but still fun to drive. This may be attributed in part to its 6-speed "multi-speed" automatic transmission that allows the driver to manually select gears if desired, with the electronically controlled transmission doing all the work of shifting. Both the engine and transmission are upgrades from the LX model.
With over 3000 miles logged on a road trip from Seattle to Los Angeles and back, never was there a want for more power. The ride was smooth and comfortable, and the transmission did a good job on the whole, notwithstanding a few occurrences of bumpy shifting. The Touring model offers some nice additional features over the LX model, some of which are discussed in the following sections.
Features That Make Road Trips More Enjoyable
The 6-speaker CD/MP3/Radio features an interesting add-on: Sirius satellite radio. It's nearly impossible to bring enough CDs on a long road trip to entirely avoid boredom, and radio stations come in and out of range as you're traveling, so satellite radio is a fantastic idea. In practice, one may or may not enjoy the selection or quality of music offered by the satellite radio stations, but there's no accounting for taste. The option of satellite radio should be most welcomed on a road trip.
The 8-way power driver's seat and adjustable lumbar support are nice upgrades, but the good stuff is standard equipment: Chrysler's trademarked "Stow'n Go" seating. Both the 2nd row captain's seats and the 3rd row split bench can be folded completely into the floor, providing a flat, unobstructed cargo space. Add a blow-up mattress and you have an instant curbside motel. With the seats in upright position, the bins in the floor provide twelve cubic feet of storage, which comes in very handy on a road trip, especially for those traveling with kids.
On the subject of storage, the Town and Country has ample amounts of it. Every nook and cranny seems to have been made into a storage compartment of some sort. The overhead console has no less than four drop-down storage bins, there are functionally two glove compartments (although only one of them is lockable), the doors have storage bins (illuminated, no less) and the front and floor consoles both have storage compartments. This is in addition to the numerous cup holders dotted throughout the cabin and the already ample cargo space.
Both the rear passenger sliding doors and the rear liftgate are powered - they open and close with a touch of a button in the overhead console, or on the remote for keyless entry. With several passengers climbing in and out at every stop, and the liftgate being opened and closed constantly to access baggage, the power option is surprisingly convenient on a road trip.
One of the coolest features on the Town and Country has to be its interior cabin lighting. The overhead console emits light blue "ambient surround lighting" - similar to the indirect light emitted from the overhead compartment on a passenger jet, but cooler somehow. Coupled with the bluish-white LED reading lights, door lights and other illumination, the lighting package lends a sleek ambiance to night-time travel.
Other Useful Features
- "Conversation Mirror" - a convex mirror in the overhead console that affords the driver and front passenger full view of the entire cabin. Perfect for watching the kids or conversing with grandma in the back.
- The climate control, although not fully automatic, does have multiple zones that give passengers in each row control over their heating and air conditioning.
- Both the pedal assembly and steering wheel are adjustable. Coupled with the power seat, the Town and Country should be able to accommodate drivers of every shape and size.
- The Chrysler website cites a trip computer and driver information center, but without reading the operating manual it's not obvious how to access those functions.
One Driver's Experience
The Chrysler website offers a comparison chart between the Town and Country Touring, the Honda Odyssey EX, the Toyota Sienna XLE and the Dodge Grand Caravan SXT. The features on all seem relatively similar. The Town and Country loses out slightly in a few departments, including horsepower and (surprisingly) interior cargo volume, but it tries to make up for it with the 6-speed transmission.
Performing a head-to-head comparative review may yield different results, but the author's experience of taking two kids, a mother-in-law and her dog on a lengthy road trip in the Town and Country was a thoroughly enjoyable one. Furthermore, with the majority of rental car fleets still comprising of domestic vehicles, the Chrysler Town and Country is probably the most accessible choice - and a good one at that.
Yee Jee Tso - Yee Jee has over 15 years of professional experience in the film and television industry with more than 50 credits - behind the camera in ...
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