7,600 Miles, 7 National Parks, 1 Spruce Goose with my F-150 Lightning

[Heybucket]

Epic! Thanks for the great write up. We have done 7 national Parks but in 1 yr! To do it on just one trip is fantastic!

agree, EV in national parks is a great pairing., especially if there are EVSE nearby! Only once did we have range anxiety traveling to a park. Kings Canyon NP was pretty out there and closest DCFC was roughly 95 miles from camp site with a 7K elevation change. But it was well worth it just for the drive out, views were amazing!

thanks for sharing! I need to step up my trip report game

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[Charge_Rob]

Epic! Thanks for the great write up. We have done 7 national Parks but in 1 yr! To do it on just one trip is fantastic!

agree, EV in national parks is a great pairing., especially if there are EVSE nearby! Only once did we have range anxiety traveling to a park. Kings Canyon NP was pretty out there and closest DCFC was roughly 95 miles from camp site with a 7K elevation change. But it was well worth it just for the drive out, views were amazing!

thanks for sharing! I need to step up my trip report game

Love it! I've been to 33 national parks in the US (and 7 in Canada) so far on my electric adventures, and Sequoia was one of my all time favorites. I did Sequoia and Kings Canyon in 2021 for a week staying in Visalia and DCFCing before heading up to the park each day.

 

[ScottC]

Congrats on an Epic trip. Great photos and info! Curious if you use CarPlay with an iphone and Apple Maps or were you leaning on Ford Navigation on your trip or other?

 

[MaintGrl]

Epic! Thanks for the great write up. We have done 7 national Parks but in 1 yr! To do it on just one trip is fantastic!

agree, EV in national parks is a great pairing., especially if there are EVSE nearby! Only once did we have range anxiety traveling to a park. Kings Canyon NP was pretty out there and closest DCFC was roughly 95 miles from camp site with a 7K elevation change. But it was well worth it just for the drive out, views were amazing!

thanks for sharing! I need to step up my trip report game

Oh, my gosh, SUCH a beautiful shot . . and even with a waterfall behind it...

 

[Aminorjourney]

Nice trip, Rob. I'm sorry I didn't get your messages about going past until you were half-way to California

 

[kjhall]

National Parks + EVs have always seemed like a perfect pairing to me. Earlier this year, I did a road trip from Michigan down to Big Bend in Texas, but for this summer's road trip I decided to go west to see the Spruce Goose in Oregon, and of course check out some new national parks along the way. Among those new parks: Theodore Roosevelt, Glacier, North Cascades, Mt. Rainier, and Olympic. I also got to revisit Redwood and Zion along the way.

The route (pins are charge locations):

Some stats:

• 7,664 miles driven
• 2.0 miles/kWh average (headwind across North Dakota and Montana hurt the average)
• 50 DC Fast Charges adding 3,165 kWh(90% BlueOval Charge Network)
  • 22 Electrify America (0 issues)
  • 11 Tesla (3 issues)
  • 5 ChargePoint (0 issues)
  • 5 EVgo (1 issues)
  • 2 Rivian Adventure Network (0 issues)
  • 1 Ford Charge (0 issues)
  • 1 EVCS (0 issues)
  • 1 Circle K (0 issues)
  • 1 Rove (0 issues)
• Assorted AC Destination Charging added 578 kWh

As someone who was burned on Electrify America charging in the past, I have been reluctant to charge with them until recently, but even then this trip blew me away with their reliability - the only large network I used on this trip with zero issues at all. Many locations along the route have been recently upgraded to their new chargers, but even the old chargers all worked, full speed, first try. Only hiccups were with Tesla and EVgo.

Road Trip:

The headwinds across North Dakota and Montana were intense coupled with the 80 mph speed limits. Luckily, the F-150 Lightning comes with its own windsock

Enchanted Highway in North Dakota:

After a thunderstorm in Glacier NP:

Above the clouds in Mt. Rainier NP:

Where the magic (cheese) happens in Tillamook, OR:

Stopping to see the Spruce Goose in McMinnville, OR:

Had to stop and get a picture with my Michigan truck and the Golden Gate!

A quick detour in to Zion NP:

Charging:

The first time I used EA's Baker hub, I was the only EV there. This time it was a full house! But even then, I never had to wait for a plug anywhere along the route.

Got to check out Rove's charging hub in LA with an on-site carwash, vacuums, lounge, and grocery store. Would love to see more of these.

I finished this road trip more covinced than ever that electric road trips are amazing, and I already can't wait for the next chance I get to take another.

Great trip and report! Thanks for sharing.

Just out of curiosity, did you pre-plan (i.e. make reservations for) all your overnight stops, or did you just wing it?

 

[Charge_Rob]

Great trip and report! Thanks for sharing.

Just out of curiosity, did you pre-plan (i.e. make reservations for) all your overnight stops, or did you just wing it?

Reserved hotels for getting to Glacier and that's it, winged it after that. Worked out well, if expensive. I normally pre-book every single night of any trip before I depart because hotels get expensive day of, but this trip took that to a new level. Some of the prices I paid were obscene, and even 24 hours before were 1/3 as much, so I will definitely be going back to pre-booking everything for future long road trips.

 

[Heybucket]

Love it! I've been to 33 national parks in the US (and 7 in Canada) so far on my electric adventures, and Sequoia was one of my all time favorites. I did Sequoia and Kings Canyon in 2021 for a week staying in Visalia and DCFCing before heading up to the park each day.

Inspiring us to hit more parks!!! Staying in Visalia is probably better call. Camp site in kings canyon was amazing but it was slim pickings on charging options!

 

[Heybucket]

Oh, my gosh, SUCH a beautiful shot . . and even with a waterfall behind it...

Thanks! Yosemite valley in June! 3 trips to park last year

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