I was the person that contacted the Casino, the Casino stated the end of May 2015 the construction will finish. I was informed the the ll contact me with the Grand Opening date for all to attend. I will attend, along with others from PDX.
Done deal, next SC looks like Ontario, Oregon, 166 miles east of Pendleton.
Hmmm...I haven't found anything for Baker City permits, but that looks closer to the location on the map; it would make much more sense...Ontario may be 166 miles from Pendleton, but those are hard miles, mostly up and over mountains, very little flat. And, it's only 80 miles from Boise - so assuming an SC in Nampa/Boise, Ontario's a poor location.
Just spent a week back East, took a chance and ran my Tesla out to the Airport and back - managing my speed, the milage left at The Dalles wasn't too uncomfortable (14 miles rated); but, worried about missing my flight, left with too little range to make it to the airport and all the way back out - I was thinking there was a Portland SC. Parked the car with 64 miles rated left, did some searching and found that Woodburn was actually closest at 43 miles, in the wrong direction of course but doable compared with back to The Dalles at 80 miles away. Got back to my car and after a week, only rated 40 miles left, 10:30 at night so limited options. Decided after analysis to risk it and headed for Woodburn anyway - talk about range anxiety! Last couple of miles were done at 40 mph, but made it with under 1% of battery left, fueled up, made it in to The Dalles, left it on the charger and took a room. Saturday Morning was back on road by 8:00, had a comfortable margin by using trucker speed limit whole way - 20 miles rated. So, had to be in Madras Sunday at 11:00, decided Tesla was good again, and made it into The Dalles even better, with 21 miles left rated, and a more comfortable ride, using the sound system and even the seat warmer a bit. Had some breakfast and came back out and had only charged 1 mile - apparently 1B and 2B there are having intermittent issues, so moved to a different charger and tried again, but again with a time crunch left with less range than I wished. It's 90 miles there, I left with 210 rated to make the round trip (spending practically the whole time I was charging verifying that no, there was no closer SC to Madras I could use on a return trip - definitely could be some better tools for finding that sort of thing out, Tesla! My phone was AWOL, so was dependant on just what the car's browser would show me, no nice little apps.)
Made it to Madras with 90 rated miles left - it's heartbreaking to have such a great car plodding along rolling hills and sweet curves at ~50 mph. But, made it back to The Dalles at 5 rated miles left. Charged up again and ready for the final leg, back home - so a full charge. But, it is about dark as I leave, and I am comfortable enough at this point that I decide to go 65 mph for the I84 leg of the trip - and changed my mind as I went past Pendleton, where once again I am worried enough about range that I can't detour the 6 miles to check out the casino construction as I had planned and dial back down to trucker speed limit of 55.
Decided to go down through La Grande instead of by Milton-Freewater and in from the North, as if I run into trouble there are a lot more options vs. a forested canyon road like 204. Make it into La Grande with 27 rated miles left, and 31 miles to go, with the last 8 being forested, hilly road but the first 22 nice and flat except for one hill. Decide to risk it after my previous experiences/successes and head up at 40 mph - it's late enough only two cars passed me the entire trip. Got up to the forested hilly part with 8.6 miles to go and 8 miles rated - I know the final 3 miles are almost completely downhill, but will I have enough power for the first 5 miles going up? I take the steepest part at 25 mph, then move to 31 for the rolling part, and with 3.3 miles left crest the top of the final hill with no rated miles left, just a "recharge now" message and a battery percentage that isn't registering. I coasted down for two miles, made the last little roll of hill, and turned into my place with visions of not being able to open the charging port dancing in my head (yes, it's a magnetic latch so have to have some electric to lock it - but still...). Parked in front of my charger and the ordeal was over. Even though it was 12:30 at night I had so much adrenalin I had to unwind for an hour before I got to sleep...
Sorry for the book, but it's still pretty fresh; most of this happened in the past 36 hours and it's been less than 7 since I plugged it in and took it out of range mode.
REALLY looking forward to the Pendleton SC!!
