For my first day I wanted to go from Long Beach to:
• California City
• Burro Schmidt’s Tunnel
• Red Rock Canyon State Park
I was starting with a nearly full battery charge. Apple CarPlay, linked to the computer in my Ford F-150 Lightning, inserted a charging stop at an Electrify America charger in Mojave.
Learning #1: CarPlay Estimates “As-Is” not “What-If”
The thing that worried me a little was that the map indicated I would have a 30% charge by the time I got to Burro Schmidt’s Tunnel. I knew this would include 14 miles of off-road driving. I also knew that mountain driving eats up range like you can’t believe (you get some of that range back when you go down the mountain.)
What I didn’t realize until my first charging stop was CarPlay estimates battery level based on current state of charge.
In other words, my map was showing what my battery level would be if I DIDN’T stop to charge in Mojave.
After I charged back to 90% my map showed that I’d have 65% battery level when I got to the tunnel.
Learning #2: Roll with the Punches
I reached Mojave with better than 50% battery level. I’d been on the road for a couple of hours, in some pretty heavy Los Angeles traffic at the start, so it was a fine place to stop.
But when I reached the Electrify America charging station, it was completely shut down. There was a crew installing solar panels over the chargers.
There was only ONE OTHER fast charger in Mojave, and if that wasn’t available I was maybe going to have to rethink my plans and head out to Lancaster. This will get better when I have a Tesla adapter in August.
Because I didn’t want to erase my CarPlay settings to look for a charger I switched to the Ford navigation, which is how I found the ChargePoint at Denny’s. I plugged in, walked down the street to Starbucks for a quick stretch and an iced chai latte.
All said, yes it was a little unpredictable but overall it wasn’t stress inducing and it all worked out fine.
You just have to roll with the situation as you find it.
