Welcome to Tesla Motors Club
Discuss Tesla's Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, Cybertruck, Roadster and More.
Register

Bay Area Distances

This site may earn commission on affiliate links.
Ok bay area folks.. my family is considering moving to the San Jose area. We have 2 children, 5 and 8. I'm wondering, what are common weekend destinations and driving vacations you might take with children of this age in this area?

I'm trying to determine if the battery size I selected (230) is appropriate. It will be fine for where we currently live, but I wouldn't want to move and realize I made a mistake.
 
Just throwing out some places:

Santa cruz
monterey
half moon bay
san francisco
napa

Supercharger accessible:
Los angeles
tahoe/reno



all should be reachable if you charge during the daytime (like at lunch, especially for napa). But I would also start considering battery degradation because the 230 pack may not make it to Los Angeles very easily 5+ years down the line if they degrade 30%.
 
Depends on what stuff you like to do. You'll easily be able to make it to the beaches, San Francisco, Monterey, all of the amusement parks in the area, and a lot of day hiking areas including Muir Woods. A day trip to napa would be right on the edge depending on how much driving around you did once up there but if you overnighted you'd be fine. As tdiggity said Tahoe is in reach with the supercharger in Folsom. Yosemite would not be an option w/ a 60Kwh pack however.
 
I think it depends on how fast you like to drive and whether or not you want to charge during your day trip. Problem is that for the 85KWH pack, you get 225-240 miles or so instead of 300 if you're cruising at higher speeds (70+ mph). But that's a pure cruise. Slowing down and speeding up will burn more energy than just cruising.

Looking at the mileage, I think the 60KWH pack will be ok for most day trips above (SF, Berkeley, Half Moon Bay, Santa Cruz).

The 60KWH is probably ok for Monterey/Carmel and there's a Supercharger at Gilroy that you can stop at on the way back if you get low on power.

I think Napa will be the real challenge given that most people go to Napa then drive all over going from winery to winery. Just there and back is almost a 200 mile round trip. More if you go to the north end of Napa Valley. And there's not a whole lot of Level 2 charging in Napa yet.

I'm getting the 85KWH pack. But I think you could make the 60KWH pack work if you're willing to charge on the longer trips.