July 2021. Monterey, CA.
Five years ago we drove our Rav4 EV to Monterey to cool off and visit the aquarium. We’d added QC Charge‘s JdeMO DC charging port to our Rav, which greatly reduced charging time and made the trip doable. The kids got to see the Monterey Bay Aquarium and other landmark buildings in the area. Great trip, and all electric thanks to QC Charge.
The 180 miles to Monterey was beyond the range of our first EV – a 2012 Toyota Rav4 EV. (If you don’t know this story Toyota declined to add the absolutely-required DC charging port to 2012-2014 Rav4 EVs). The EPA-rated range of our Rav4 EV was 113 miles so we needed to stop along the way to charge. Adding 100 miles to the battery pack via Toyota’s preferred method would have taken 4 to 5 hours on a Level 2 charging station. But thanks to the JdeMO port we only needed 40 minutes to charge in Fremont while we ate lunch.
Five years later we made the trip to Monterey again in our Model Y. With 300+ miles of rated-range1, the trip was a cinch: We charged our car to 90% the night before and drove straight to our hotel with 65 miles of range to spare. There are currently 2 Superchargers around Monterey, and plenty along the route so we had our choices for where to charge on the ride home. While the storage area in the Rav4 EV was easier to pack, the Model Y gets the job done. Plus 300 miles of range. And Superchargers. The world has changed.
Like previous trips we escaped the summer heat in our town and cooled off in Monterey’s pleasant coastal weather. This year the kids were old enough to take kayaks out on the Bay to view otters in their natural environment. We also enjoyed the beach, played some volleyball, walked around town – Monterey is a really nice town.
I miss our Rav4 EV. After 7 years of service and 88,000 miles we sold it to a family that was buying their first EV. We picked up the Model Y to replace our Rav. I’m going to write up a piece about selling our first EV, but each time I sit down to start I get all verklempt…. so for now that remains a story for another time.
1 Rated range: EPA estimate of how far you can travel based on how much energy is stored in your battery pack.