5 Of The Best Cars For Solo Road Trips

One of the best kinds of travel is the unfettered, loosely planned road trip. Forget a cross-country flight; I'd rather pack up my bags and head for the horizon behind the wheel of a car, seeing interesting sites, exploring local haunts, and taking in as much culture and scenery as possible along the way. In my many years of testing cars and in my personal car history I've gone across America nearly a dozen times. I used vans, pick-up trucks, small SUVs, and most entertainingly, in sports cars — all for the love of a good road trip. And many of my best miles have been solo, stopping whenever I wanted, eating, refueling, and exploring on a whim. For this kind of solo road trip, what are the best cars for the job?

I love a car that's both entertaining and comfortable. Solo road trips mean that you can drive a winding back road whenever you'd like, exploiting impressive driving dynamics, but you're also the only driver. That means there's nobody to switch off with if you get tired, made worse if you're driving something that's harshly sprung or uncomfortable on bumpy highways. Thankfully, with a solo road trip, you don't need much storage space either, so something with two seats and a tiny trunk will get the job done just as well as any sedan or SUV, and may be even better. With those rough parameters in mind, these are cars that I've got considerable experience with, all of which I'd happily load into and head for the horizon in on a moment's notice.

Having driven several versions of older first-, second-, and third-generation Miatas, and having road-tripped a fourth-gen ND1 Mazda Miata all the way from Texas to California, I can safely say that I enjoy road-tripping Miatas, no matter the model year. The latest Miata, though, is probably the most entertaining to drive. Its 2.0-liter four-cylinder engine produces 181 horsepower and 151 lb-ft of torque, which isn't exactly exciting, but it's paired with an excellent six-speed manual transmission.

The Miata's power levels are low, but you can live high in the rev range on hidden back roads winding the four-cylinder out to its 7,500 rpm redline, then shifting your own gears, and calming things down for a regular cruising speed on the highway. The six-speed manual Miata is rated at 34 mpg highway by the EPA, so your fun road trip can still be a fuel efficient one.

In every Miata generation, the trunk space is limited, so solo road trips are probably the best kind of trip to take in an MX-5. In the current Miata trunk, there are less than 5 cubic feet of cargo storage — a space small enough that it kept me from overpacking. It can also get a bit noisy inside a Miata, thanks to the thin soft top, but a bit of music will solve that problem. The base trim level of the Miata has an MSRP of just $31,665 (including a $1,265 destination fee), so what it lacks in power and cargo space, it makes up for in fun and affordability.

If you're looking for something a bit more powerful and with a bit more space than a four-cylinder Miata, the Chevrolet Corvette will certainly fit the bill. A base Corvette is more than double the price of the Mazda, but having driven multiple C7 and C8 generation Corvettes up and down the Pacific Coast, I can say that the V8-powered Chevy coupé is one of the best solo road trippers money can buy.

I recently spent a week behind the wheel of the current-generation mid-engine Corvette, which offers an excellent combination of practicality and power. It comes with a combination of trunks: one in the rear, with 9.1 cubic feet of cargo space, and another up front, with about 3 cb ft extra, for a total of 12.6 cubic feet. Under the hood of the standard C8 Corvette is a monster 6.2-liter V8 that produces 495 hp and 470 lb-ft. For being so powerful, the latest Corvette is also surprisingly efficient. The EPA rates it at 25 mpg highway in its most-efficient trims — a number I've seen more than once at the pump when I was able to avoid the temptations of V8-powered speed.

The C8 Corvette also has one of the best sound systems I've ever experienced in a sports car, or any from-the-factory car of any kind. The available 14-speaker Bose system fills the cabin with ultra-high-quality music, massive amounts of volume, and clarity that you can scarcely believe is coming from a car stereo. If you like to watch the mile markers slip by as you belt out your favorite tunes at maximum volume, this is the perfect solo road trip car for you.

Since Porsche has killed off the 718 Cayman (at least for now), you'll have to find a used one to drive around, but the search would be worth it just to take the Cayman on a road trip. The two-door, two-seater Porsche coupé feels premium: Playful on a winding canyon road, easy to drive over long distances, and properly comfortable for just one person. Having recently tested a Cayman, I give my full recommendation to shoppers looking for the upgraded GTS 4.0, but really any trim level will do. That said, the GTS' engine (a spicy 4.0-liter flat-six) puts out 394 hp and 317 lb-ft, so this is the one to get if you want a sporty experience.

The Cayman is smaller, less-powerful, and not quite as quick as its 911 sibling, but the little sibling is still built with the same meticulous attention to detail and a focus on performance. Plus, without the need to carry around extra baggage for a second person, you can eschew the 911's back-seat space to begin with. The Cayman offers two different areas for your cargo: a standard trunk and a front trunk. When they're combined, they make up about 15 cubic feet of total cargo space — but don't expect to fit anything bigger than small carry-on luggage in there. On the upside, the Cayman will cost significantly less than its big-brother 911, and the two are similarly-spec'd models. For drivers that want a sunnier road trip experience, there's always the Cayman's soft-top twin Boxster.

Limited in terms of space, but not when it comes to performance or panache, the Acura NSX is one of the greatest mid-engine sports cars of all time. It's also astonishingly comfortable, no matter which generation model you go with. I've driven a few different versions of the NSX, including the latest and greatest Type S that was discontinued just a few years ago and the iconic first-generation NSX that started it all. Neither was the kind of roomy experience I'd want for a road trip with another person, but I'd happily take any generation of NSX on a solo road trip.

The original NSX would provide nostalgia and comfort, along with an ultra-limited cargo space capacity of just 5.0-cubic feet. Thankfully, the original NSX wasn't underpowered or underwhelming at all. It was motivated by a high-revving 3.0-liter V6 that produced 270 hp and 252 lb-ft — plenty of gusto for the lightweight package. It also had an excellent manual transmission that was a joy to shift.

The modern NSX, in its swan-song Type S trim, put out a much more impressive 600 hp and 492 lb-ft, via a twin-turbo 3.5-liter V6 paired with a hybrid system and sending power to all four wheels courtesy of a 9-speed dual-clutch transmission. It had much more performance than the original, but ironically less cargo space. The modern NSX only offered 4.4 cubic feet of cargo storage, so it would be even less well suited to two-person travel. Its active magnetorheological suspension dampers could soak up just about any bump, though, so it's just as well-suited for a long-distance journey.

Arguably Jaguar's most iconic car, and widely considered one of the most beautiful cars of all time, is the E-Type. It defined an era for the British auto manufacturer and I still stop and stare anytime I see one in the wild. And while the modern F-Type is not a replacement for the E-Type, it is certainly a spiritual successor, providing a striking beauty all its own. Whether you go with the coupé or convertible, there are few modern ways more stylish to enjoy a road trip than behind the wheel of a Jaguar F-Type.

I've taken various years and trim levels of F-Types on road trips, commuted in them and lived with them on a daily basis, and I even took an early F-Type Coupé R to an open track day at Buttonwillow Raceway way back in 2014 — the F-Type excelled at all of it. Every trip I took in the various F-Types seemed to include some sort of impromptu photo shoot, and it was well-received no matter where I drove it.

I prefer the early versions of the F-Type, before Jaguar added all-wheel drive to the mix, and while I'd prefer the big, supercharged, 550-horsepower V8 under the hood, I'll readily admit just how good the available supercharged V6 was as well. The V6 version put out a healthy 380 hp and 339 lb-ft, with less weight up front to mess with the Jag's handling characteristics. The F-Type convertible has a really small trunk, measuring in at 7 cubic feet, and the coupé doesn't do much better, with just 8 cubic feet, so be sure to pack light.