I know some like the Escape. My family and I are in Fairbanks seeing the northern lights (aurora borealis). I rented a 4WD Escape. Please. I pulled off the road heading into a turnout 8 inches of snow started to back out and got stuck. no options. we got out the shovel my lightweight daughter in the drivers seat and after about 10 minutes of clearing the wheels and rocking we got out. next the interior of the windows formed ice even with the heater on hi with and without air conditioning. anyway, all was well, we got a little scared out in the wilderness, (not armed) as my kids are a little leary and we flew up so I could not carry.in any case, we had a great time and saw some amazing aurora. but Ford Escape is NOT i repeat NOT a 4Runner............next time we drive the Beast...........LOL

I used to own a 4wd Escape before the 4Runner. I took it out at the tail end of an 18" snow storm and had no problems. I think that it wouldn't have made it in snow any deeper, but I have to admit it handled 18" of snow without any real drama.

The Escape is really a front wheel drive vehicle that activates the rear wheels when it goes into 4wd mode. There's no low range gearing, so it's really more of an AWD vehicle, but Ford still calls it 4wd.