Looking at the bright side, you live in the most beautiful and in my mind the best place in north america! but i have a useful thought too- how cold is it there? cause unless your on the coast, its probally not warm and cold weather kills gas mileage and power in explorers. I live on the mn/ontario border and when the temps drop below 20 (all temps F), so does the gas mileage. when we had our cold spell and it didnt get above -10 for about 2 weeks, often dropping to -40, i was doing good to get 15 on the highway, it was probally closer to 13. and I had limited power too. usually 0 will get me about 17-18 highway and about 20 or 30 it SHOULD be back up to 23. all this is at 65 mph.
The 91 i had was never affected in any way by the cold, it ran fine, never lost power and gas mileage only changed when it dipped below -20. But I'm thinking either all the new junk that they threw in these newer explorers (2002+) has hurt it or mine is just wierd. So i guess what i am saying is what your planning on doing is good, a CAI is a must as well as synthetic. I have a K&N, no cats, all synthetic and 40 psi in stock tires when i used to have them. although after all this was said and done, my city mileage dropped to about 12-13 when my highway mileage went up by 2 mpg. same driving habits too. so try some stuff and wait til it gets above freezing before you really get worried. Good luck!
