Well, I just got home from the longest trip yet in the MINI. My girlfriend and I took a drive from our home in Victoria on Vancouver Island to the far north of BC, not too far south of Alaska. The drive covers an array of landscapes, from desert in the interior to swollen rivers, black bear and lush forests further north, and even a scary stretch of slushy snow and high winds on one mountain pass. Not pleasant on summer tires!

There are a lot of hill climbs, and I was concerned about the performance of my little NA engine. However even on steep climbs I had no trouble passing lines of vehicles, certainly surprising a few people. I won't post anything about top speeds for fear of having the thread locked, but on a few occasions the wipers were screaming as they tried to cling to the windshield when I insisted on passing just one more car before the passing lane ended

I've learned the key to passing, especially on an incline, in this car is to drop to 3rd rather than 4th and push it north of 6000rpm before shifting up to 4th. I only wish I had figured this out sooner. These highways are very long and when they straighten out visibility is enormous. The car felt very stable far above my normal driving speeds which is great to know.

I feel the SprintBooster I installed a month back made all the downshifts MUCH smoother, and there were a lot of them. It paid for itself on this trip IMO.

As for mileage, it was good when I tried to make it a priority but suffered when I couldn't keep my foot out of it. On one stretch I made a point of turning on the cruise to slightly above the limit (110KM/H) which is only safe when there is no one else around. The locals travel these stretches very quickly. On a leg of about 300KM I had my best mileage of 6L/100KM which I believe is about 39mpg US. Generally I was driving to enjoy myself and got closer to 34-36mpg.

Comfort was not plush, of course, but adequate. I would have liked to have the sport seats and my girlfriend said her back got achy after a few hours. My clutch leg got a little sore after the first 8 hours of driving but some seat adjustments and a rest day seemed to sort that out.

I went through an entire gallon of wiper fluid trying to clear dead insects off the windscreen. The entire front of my car is caked in dead bugs, and the grille is jammed with dead wasps. It is disgusting, I can't wait to get to a car wash!

Overall the car did great. I was worried about my old battery but no issues, although I will replace it soon just to be safe. There were a few occasions where some forced induction would have been a treat, but after improving my downshifting timing I managed to do without it. I imagine if I trade up to an S, I won't need to turn the AC off before passing, though

 

Sounds good. We just got back from a road trip where we ended up in Victoria, BC.

 

sweet.
I'm going to cover 1180 miles this weekend (Houston to N. Arkansas). up tomorrow morning, and back down on Sunday. hope my trip goes as well as yours did. some time soon i want to take a trip from houston to Washington state to visit my girlfriends dad.

 

Thanks guys! Where I live MINIs are a dime a dozen, but the further north I went, I saw less and less on the road. It's definitely Lifted Pick-Up Country up there! In town I never get waves, but the two MINIs I saw on my roadtrip actually waved at me!