Recommendation for OCCASIONAL snow travel

[TrojanGT]

Happy New Year, dear wise car folks!We're at 45000 miles and need desperately (have for sometime!) to replace the original Conti's on our GT (2003 Moon 'n Tunes w/16") Costco has their Bridgestone/Michelin promotion going on, and we've just gotta get new tires, so...What do you folks recommend? In researching things, I would have loved to get the zero-pressure Michelins, but can't quite figure out if they come in the right size (P205/55R16?) A side issue of minor importance - We live here in Los Angeles, so in general, snow/cold weather issues aren't on the top of our thoughts. Occasional rain, OK. However, my husband keeps talking about driving up to Salt Lake (Utah) in the wintertime. Reading the tire posts here, if we get the Michelin Pilot MXM4 or Energy MXV4+, is driving in the snow/cold a horrible idea? If he's stuck to this idea, does anyone have a great four-season tire to recommend that copes the better with the snow than these (preferably in the Michelin or Bridgestone line). Our timeline is to put these on in the next two weeks, to get that $60 "Costco wallet" discount! Much mahalo for the input!Dawn

[Caretaker]

Trojan: simply enter the words tire rating into your search engine. Go to the Tire Rack or other site to do some reading. I am a big advocate of the new Firestone Dayton Daytonas with the traction technology they built into it. It is supposed to keep the same traction throughout the life of the tread. Good luck.

[Raven]

For a very occasional, rare drive to Salt Lake City it would not be worth comprimising the warm weather, dry road capabilities of a good summer tire. if you were going to the mountains and the weather was going to be snowy, you could always rent a car with all-season or winter tires. P.S. 45,00 miles on the Cont's must be some kind of record, you're lucky to get 10,000 miles out of them.

[TrojanGT]

Don't be too impressed. The Continentals should have been replaced at least 15,000 miles ago, IMHO They are just about as smooth as can be on the centers, and not much more grip on the edges... too far gone.We just went to our local Costco and ordered the Michelin Pilot XGT's, sticking with the original size - 205/55R16 89 or something like that. The guy at the desk basically felt these were the best available in our size, old technology but good tech. Anybody have any feedback on these tires? Mahalo,Dawn