My 16 year old son recently received his Ontario G2 license, so - what better time to do my first roadtrip on public (or EV community) charging infrastructure on a visit to see my other son in Ottawa. Also, it gave my son the opportunity to have his first drive in the roadster.
Our chosen route was GTA-Peterborough-Ottawa-Kingston-GTA.
We left on Friday afternoon and had a smooth drive on the 407 and backroads (straight line route) to the Best Western hotel in Peterborough (Sun Country Highway 70A charger).
For this leg, we had a very strong wind on our tail, and averaged a very economical 141 Wh/km.
We could have continued to Ottawa, but we had already decided to stay overnight at the hotel, so we caught a movie in town, and had a great steak dinner at Berc's steakhouse which is the site of another Sun Country charger (30A).
On Saturday, we set out at 8:45am, and arrived in Ottawa before noon averaging 155Wh/km. My son drove for part of the trip on Friday and Saturday, and as the results will show, he seems to be able to use much less energy than I do when I am behind the wheel.... It must be my lead foot!
A big thank you to Doug G who provided access to a charger at his office while we went for lunch in the area. This gave us most of what we needed, but after driving back and forth between downtown and the west end of Ottawa, I decided to charge at the Ottawa City Hall charger in downtown.
This is where things got interesting! As soon as the current started to flow from the Eaton charger at City Hall, the charging unit completely shut down, like a fuse had blown. We spoke to the security personnel onsite, and called the Ottawa 311 number, but there wasn't much that could be done on a Saturday night.
Since my hotel (Brookstreet) only had a 120v/15A receptacle for charging,
I really wanted to have a substantially full charge before the end of the evening, in advance of the trip back home on Sunday. To explore more charging options, we decided to check out the Museum of Science and Technology, which has another Sun Country 70A charger. In spite of the lonely and dark location on Saturday night, I was able to access the site without issue, and discovered that there is a Kelsey's restaurant less than 10 minutes walk from the Museum.
By the time we had finished dinner, the roadster was fully charged once again. Choosing our target restaurant based on proximity to the charging station wasn't the initial plan, but worked out fine.
Overnight, with the trickle charger, I gained approximately 50km in range charge mode.
For the trip from Ottawa-Kingston, Doug G suggested country road #10, which was a beautiful and quiet route where we could drive at 80-85 km/h without any pressure from trucks or other cars. We had a headwind for this leg, and averaged 165Wh/km.
We made it to Kingston by 11am, and were still in time for their Sunday Brunch. We charged for 2 hours at the Best Western Fireside Inn, again at 70A (A big THANK YOU to Kent and the Sun Country Highway team for making this possible).
After brunch, we walked to the nearby shops, and the time flew by. This put us back at full charge for the long stretch (258km) on the 401 from Kingston to Toronto Yorkdale mall. We knew that Cobourg and Oshawa were options if we felt that we were going to be short, but we didn't need either. With a combination of driving behind some slower trucks (90-100km/h) and 'normal' driving, we averaged 159Wh/km and arrived at Yorkdale mall with 80km remaining in Range mode.
The security people in the parking garage were very helpful to move the pylons so that I could park close enough to the Tesla HPC and get a top up charge to allow us to finish the journey. We also took the opportunity to see the Tesla store again, and for my son to get a demo of the Model S experience.
The return home was uneventful, except for a slight coating of freezing rain, making the roads just a little slippery.
Overall, a great weekend. We really need one or more hotels in Ottawa (and other destinations) to have dedicated EV charging, ideally at 70A. I will encourage Brookstreet, based on my latest experience, and it would be ideal if there was a hotel downtown with charging as well.
As expected, the roadster performed flawlessly. Looking forward to the next roadtrip!
David
Our chosen route was GTA-Peterborough-Ottawa-Kingston-GTA.
We left on Friday afternoon and had a smooth drive on the 407 and backroads (straight line route) to the Best Western hotel in Peterborough (Sun Country Highway 70A charger).
For this leg, we had a very strong wind on our tail, and averaged a very economical 141 Wh/km.
We could have continued to Ottawa, but we had already decided to stay overnight at the hotel, so we caught a movie in town, and had a great steak dinner at Berc's steakhouse which is the site of another Sun Country charger (30A).
On Saturday, we set out at 8:45am, and arrived in Ottawa before noon averaging 155Wh/km. My son drove for part of the trip on Friday and Saturday, and as the results will show, he seems to be able to use much less energy than I do when I am behind the wheel.... It must be my lead foot!
A big thank you to Doug G who provided access to a charger at his office while we went for lunch in the area. This gave us most of what we needed, but after driving back and forth between downtown and the west end of Ottawa, I decided to charge at the Ottawa City Hall charger in downtown.
This is where things got interesting! As soon as the current started to flow from the Eaton charger at City Hall, the charging unit completely shut down, like a fuse had blown. We spoke to the security personnel onsite, and called the Ottawa 311 number, but there wasn't much that could be done on a Saturday night.
Since my hotel (Brookstreet) only had a 120v/15A receptacle for charging,
I really wanted to have a substantially full charge before the end of the evening, in advance of the trip back home on Sunday. To explore more charging options, we decided to check out the Museum of Science and Technology, which has another Sun Country 70A charger. In spite of the lonely and dark location on Saturday night, I was able to access the site without issue, and discovered that there is a Kelsey's restaurant less than 10 minutes walk from the Museum.
By the time we had finished dinner, the roadster was fully charged once again. Choosing our target restaurant based on proximity to the charging station wasn't the initial plan, but worked out fine.
Overnight, with the trickle charger, I gained approximately 50km in range charge mode.
For the trip from Ottawa-Kingston, Doug G suggested country road #10, which was a beautiful and quiet route where we could drive at 80-85 km/h without any pressure from trucks or other cars. We had a headwind for this leg, and averaged 165Wh/km.
We made it to Kingston by 11am, and were still in time for their Sunday Brunch. We charged for 2 hours at the Best Western Fireside Inn, again at 70A (A big THANK YOU to Kent and the Sun Country Highway team for making this possible).
After brunch, we walked to the nearby shops, and the time flew by. This put us back at full charge for the long stretch (258km) on the 401 from Kingston to Toronto Yorkdale mall. We knew that Cobourg and Oshawa were options if we felt that we were going to be short, but we didn't need either. With a combination of driving behind some slower trucks (90-100km/h) and 'normal' driving, we averaged 159Wh/km and arrived at Yorkdale mall with 80km remaining in Range mode.
The security people in the parking garage were very helpful to move the pylons so that I could park close enough to the Tesla HPC and get a top up charge to allow us to finish the journey. We also took the opportunity to see the Tesla store again, and for my son to get a demo of the Model S experience.
The return home was uneventful, except for a slight coating of freezing rain, making the roads just a little slippery.
Overall, a great weekend. We really need one or more hotels in Ottawa (and other destinations) to have dedicated EV charging, ideally at 70A. I will encourage Brookstreet, based on my latest experience, and it would be ideal if there was a hotel downtown with charging as well.
As expected, the roadster performed flawlessly. Looking forward to the next roadtrip!
David
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