Packed for Fun in the 2018 Toyota Highlander Hybrid

I received use of a 2018 Toyota Highlander Hybrid in exchange for my review. All opinions are my own.

This summer we took an awesome family trip to Cape Cod for a family reunion. We were really excited to be able to test drive the 2018 Toyota Highlander Hybrid for the week for a blog post. Conveniently, the car was delivered to my sister-in-law’s house so we could take off for our family trip.

Upon getting the car we immediately started packing it up for our week of fun. Some other family members took our kids so we were able to put down the third row of seats and load up all of our things.  We packed the trunk and third row full!

The family we were with was family that we hadn’t seen in two years so we had a lot of fun to pack into this week. Good thing we had all the space the Toyota Highlander had to offer us. The car was very flexible to all of our situations. We had the whole car packed and only three passengers, we had the car packed with seven passengers, we had the trunk and one back seat down to pack in six people and luggage and we had a field trips with just 6 passengers and no luggage. We it really awesome to be able to manipulate the seating in the car to fit each of those situations.

Our time in Massachusetts was a hot one so I LOVED having the cooled seats (which also can be heated). Along with the zoned air, the cooled seats made sure we were a comfortable temperature. It also meant a ton of ice cream during the week.

We did quite a bit of driving while on the trip. This was our first time driving a hybrid so I was interested to see how far the gas would go and how much power the car had. Throughout all of our driving we never had to buy gas during the week. I think we drove close to 400 miles but because of the awesome features of the hybrid, we had plenty of gas still in the tank at the end of our trip.

Our experience with the East coaster drivers was that they weren’t the best at driving so I was glad for the safety features of the Toyota Highlander Hybrid. Blind spot monitoring was great. I love the lane departure warning with steering assist in case you cross any lines you shouldn’t.

I really loved the birds eye view camera so we could be aware of our surroundings. At home we drive a minivan so we don’t have to worry about doors that open wide. We made a rule with the kids that an adult needed to open to the door because I didn’t want them to ding the Toyota’s door against another car. The Birds Eye camera also helped them be aware of how close we were to other cars. It’s awesome.

As previously mentioned, this was our first time driving a hybrid so it was really cool to see the Hybrid Energy Monitor. It would show where the power in the car was coming from. Depending on speed and driving conditions you could see when the car was using battery power of fuel. We did a lot of different driving from freeways to side streets, to busy two lane highways with stop and go traffic and the Hybrid Energy Monitor was really interesting to watch in the different scenarios.

Since we had three kids using electronics throughout the trip I loved that the car had USB ports for charging. Between those ports and extra battery packs we were kept energized and entertained while on the road.

At one point while on our way back from the beach resort to family’s house our car was so packed that we had to first get items out of the back through the window before opening the door. If we opened the back some of our luggage would have fallen out. My husband is really good at packing things like a puzzle so there was order to the chaos.

While the third row was a little squishy, we put kids back there so it worked fine. We had such a fun week with family, being on the East coast, visiting the beach and having a great experience with the 2018 Toyota Highlander Hybrid. It’s an awesome car that is great for families while also feeling luxurious. I loved the week in this SUV!