Destination #5 Indianapolis- wolves!!

Yesterday I drove through Fort Wayne, IN to see a friend who has a farm there (hey Ron, was good to see you!). Had a great afternoon hanging out, grilled hamburgers for dinner, then continued down to Indy. He had the most adorable baby peacocks there! I intended to update the blog last night, but went to the pool instead. lol

I have spent the last couple of days in Indianapolis at the Hilton Garden Inn by the airport. They don't have a destination charger OR a public charger, but the did let me plug into an outdoor 110 outlet. I was charging at about 5 mph, but hey, it was enough of a boost to get to the nearby supercharger in the morning if needed. I actually stopped with about 100 miles left on the car so I would have been fine anyway, but never say no to free charges! For the record, the staff here is amazing and the pool/hot tub temps are perfect! Not too hot and not too cold.  The room is large and the bed is comfy.
This morning I woke up bright and early, had breakfast, and went off on my adventures. I had gained about 40 miles overnight from the 110 outlet, not too bad.

I am doing this to give an overall picture of what it is like to drive an EV, and want to make sure it is honest and real, not all just the rose-colored glasses experience. I feel like this trip has really pretty much all been rainbows and unicorns though, with no problems at all except for that first night when the charger at the car dealership didn't work. Today I had the second hiccup on the trip, and this time it was at a Tesla supercharger. I arrived at the supercharger in SE Indianapolis and the first 3 stalls I tried wouldn't work. Bummer and momentary panic attack that something was wrong with my car.

I took a deep breath and called the Tesla roadside assistance number (it's a button on the touch screen that dials them directly so you always have the number handy). They are always super nice and helpful and can check the diagnostics on the car over the air no matter where you are at.  The guy said they were showing power issues with the stations and my car was fine. He told me which stations appeared to be working (1A and 4B) so I moved to 4B and had no problem. I charged to 300 because I had a 185 mile round trip today with no chargers of any kind on my route, not even any public chargers, and wanted to have some emergency extra.

Where did I go? I went to PLAY WITH WOLVES!!!! Yep, there is an awesome place called Wolf Creek Habitat where you can give a "donation" to go into the enclosures and interact with their wolves. You can also go up on the overlook bridge and just watch them for free.  I highly recommend the interaction (get there early for the wolves to be most active, they open at 10 and are only open on weekends), it is totally worth it. Wolf kisses are the best!!! :-)

Funny story, it actually took me about 30 minutes to get away from my car when I arrived at WCH, because a couple of groups of people kept leaving and stopping at the car to see it. lol  I let a couple of people sit in it and showed it to a bunch of others.  It is pretty far out there with no chargers around so I guess no one out there has ever seen a Tesla in person. let alone a Model 3. Good thing I enjoy sharing with people and being an EV ambassador! :-)

Side note, I am super bummed my hair seems to be fading now. This is how it started out....

 

On the way home I arrived back at the south Indy supercharger with 40% battery left. I went back to good old 4B and plugged in. There was one other Tesla there, a black model 3. This was the first time I have seen another M3 on my trip. He was having trouble with charging so I got out to chat and let him know he needed to go over to 1A.  When I got back in my car I realized it had stopped charging. Crap on cracker. Tried twice more, no dice. Going to have to wait for the other guy to finish. I got back out to chat again and while we were talking another gentleman came over and asked to look at our cars. He has a reservation but hasn't seen one in person yet so we both let him poke around and see the cars/ask questions.  The black car finished and moved over one spot so I could move to the one working station, then we got pictures of the two M3's next to each other since it is rare to see 2 at once. :-)

I charged up to 90% and headed back to the hotel to go swimming and then a friend came over to go to dinner (in my car). Hey Shannon, love you girl! Ben seems pretty cool too :-) Tonight I am plugged back in on the 110 outlet to top up and be ready for tomorrow; I am heading out bright and early.

Numbers as of dinner:
miles driven: 4011.14
kwh used: 996 (4 miles per kwh)
cost of electricity $99.38 
cost of gas: $481.40
total savings: $382.02

2 minor issues that were easily resolved.
under 3 hours extra travel time over driving an ICE car.
met dozens of people asking to see the car or asking about Teslas/EV's in general
never stopping to buy gas- priceless!