A power-aware route maintenance protocol for Mobile Ad Hoc Networks (MANETs) is introduced. Termed Dynamic Path Switching (DPS), the new protocol puts an overloaded node to sleep before a route link breaks because that node runs out of energy, and brings other suitable nodes into play instead. When the battery charge of a node reaches a stated level, the node can advance a request to change to a sleep state for a while. The request is honoured unless survival of some path rests on the forwarding activity of that very node. All nodes are assumed to be collaborative. The DPS protocol is fully backward compatible, as it can be implemented within existing routing protocols such as Dynamic Source Routing (DSR). The new protocol has been extensively simulated with the established network simulator NS2. The findings indicate a much improved power awareness of the updated routing protocol with respect to the unadorned one. Power saving is particularly effective during long-lived sessions.