We took the plunge!

We purchased a 2015 176T from our local dealer in Saskatoon (who also happens to be a neighbor) on Friday, right before they shut down for two weeks for Christmas.  The bad news is I can't pick it up before January.  The good news is we won't be going anywhere with it before May, so there is no rush. However, we are really looking forward to getting it in our yard so we can stare at it for a few months ;-)  It will be a little strange to tow it home and then winterize it before we even go anywhere . . .

Awesome!  Welcome!

Welcome.  You'll be fine with weight if you are careful, it has a 2600 pound weight dry, figure it will be pushing your 3500 pound limit fully loaded if you have the water tank full.  Only take a few gallons for use on the road and fill up when you get where you are going.

Welcome to the world of podding.  Guaranteed you will enjoy your pod AND expect to give tours at every campground you go to.  We rarely have it where we don't give at least one tour per campground.  Last September we went to RMNP, CO  for 2 weeks and even though we didn't give many tours at the park, we did find ourselves giving tours along the expressway at gas stations, stores, ect.  

So, in the midst of our excitement around planning our big trip this summer we decided to start figuring out what we have and what else we need to buy.  Setting it all aside and weighing it and then estimating the weights of what we don't have made me decide to do some math.  The 2009 Sienna can tow 3500lbs and the GVWR is 5690lbs.  We can load 1140lbs in the trailer, but that would put it overweight so we can only load about 800lbs.  I estimate we'll have about 600lbs in the trailer.  The van can carry 1420lbs including passengers and tongue weight and we probably will have 900lbs so we're within that limit, too.  The problem I ran into was the GCWR (the weight of everything) is 7827lbs, but the weight estimates I have already put me at 8074lbs and that is running completely dry.  It's an expensive lesson, but the only safe thing to do is upgrade the tow vehicle.  If it was just me I'd buy a 6-8 year old F-150 and load the kids in the back and my wife can keep her van, but she's ready for an upgrade so I think we'll end up with a Jeep Grand Cherokee Limited.  She also wants to check out the Acura MDX and the Infinity QX60, but I don't see a lot of people towing with those.  I like what I've read about the 5.8L HEMI in the Jeep.  Does anyone have an opinion between the 3.6L Pentastar and the HEMI?  6200lbs towing capacity vs. 7200lbs, 17/24mpg vs. 14/22mpg.  I'm thinking that I'll like the extra power of the HEMI going through the mountains and I wonder if the eco mode will narrow that mpg gap in real life driving since most of our everyday driving around here is flat.  Does anyone have any experience with these units?  Thanks in advance!