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The Ultimate Journey – Babies to Boomers
2009 Dodge Journey

Bill - The Dodge Journey enters the market as once again a manufacturer attempts to identify a segment in the very crowded world of mid-size SUV and Crossover vehicles. The Journey is built on the same platform as the Avenger sedan and offers room for five and available third-row seating in SXT and R/T trim packages. It’s meant to give people an option, and keep them in the Dodge fold, when they’re ready to get out of their mini-van. There are two engine choices a 2.4-liter 4-cylinder in the base SE and a 3.5-liter V6 in the R/T and SXT iterations.

Cathy - The same great engineering of the award winning Chrysler mini-van made this little crossover a mini-me. Every wonderful detail of the soccer-moms limousine has been incorporated in to the Journey. The storage cubbies are everywhere; including hidden coolers on the passenger floor.  Not just a permanent cooler but the tray comes out to bring to the tailgate party.  Oh! Finally a place to put your purse or hide your valuables when parked.  Under the front row passenger seat is a space for a nice size purse, jumper cables or first-aid kit.

Bill – While it offers a lot of interesting features I’m concerned about the somewhat anemic 4-cyliner 173 horsepower with only 166 lb-ft of torque trying to move the more than 2-ton Journey on anything other than a flat road. The V6 at 235 horsepower and 232 lb-ft of torque does an okay job and the AWD is rated up to 3500lbs towing capacity, but in truth, I don’t see the vehicle doing much heavy duty hauling so the mechanicals will probably be just fine for everyday use and occasional light towing duties.

Cathy – I believe a young family might have a small boat to tow or a couple of us boomers might hook our motorcycles on the back; it would be just fine. Some of the other interesting features you mentioned include the integrated child booster seats in the rear, chillzone glove box for beverages, three 12-volt power outlets, one 115-volt outlet, 8-inch DVD screen, MP3/HDD compatible radio, SIRIUS for a year and ParkView, rear back-up camera with the Navigation system and a flashlight built in to the cargo area.

Bill - The biggest surprise for me was how quiet the Journey is and with the competition being the Chevy Equinox, Ford Edge, Saturn’s Vue and the RAV4, and with pricing starting under $20,000, it may be the best in class. The base price is $19,985, the SXT bases at $22,985 and the top of the line R/T at $26,545 which means you can get the Journey pretty well loaded out including AWD for under $30,000. Not bad.

Cathy – Dodge has truly made the crossover a vehicle for the young family starting out as well as the empty nester that is truly ready for the next Journey.