Welcome to Tesla Motors Club
Discuss Tesla's Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, Cybertruck, Roadster and More.
Register

San Diego to Yellowstone

This site may earn commission on affiliate links.
Just drove almost 4K miles in my Y-LR. San Diegg to Colorado and Yellowstone. Had Tesla's for 6 years, This was the easiest road trip ever. More SC's, Newer cars charger faster, never waited to charge. Best of all, averaged 251 Wh/mi. over the entire trip. AC on, often 80 mph. Luckily no cold weather, no major headwinds. Thought I'd average more like 275 Wh/mi. Around Yellowstone you have to go about 40 mph, so excellent range in that area. 19" tires, inflated to 45 psi for travel. Tesla, SD to Yellowstone.jpg
 
@GregW could you make a summary of your itinerary, in particular if you took any overnight stays
or did you look at some see sight, during your trip to Yellowstone, such as Grand Teton National Park...

How long did you stay in Yellowstone?
Did you stay in one location like near the West Yellowstone Supercharger and visited a different area every day,
or did you went from one lodge to another one, using then an L2 charger overnight?
 
@GregW , I wonder if you encountered similar issues:

When reading some older threads, there was complaints about not getting any cell coverage inside the Yellowstone park
thus loosing map information so a recommendation was to take pictures or print out of the itinerary.
I downloaded offline maps to Google, for my phone and used that... I have both Verizon and AT&T and can vouch for the crappy cell coverage there.. While I was there, I found Verizon coverage to be much worse than AT&T. West gate had plenty of cell coverage until about halfway to the 4-way stop inside the park... There were a couple places inside the park where I had signal along the river, when my kids were playing.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Watts_Up
Also, while driving to yellowstone, there was consistent/strong cell signal all the way up US-20 all the way up to the west entrance... However, there is next to no signal on state highway 33, if you cut across the Tetons that way... (I cut across the tetons on state route 33, then through Tetons NP into Yellowstone.. Afterwards, we left yellowstone thru west entrance, and down US-20)
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Watts_Up
@Watts_Up,
Poor cell/internet in Yellowstone. Pre-download Yellowstone maps and apps. There are 2-3 suggested National Park/Yellowstone apps that are helpful. There is limited coverage, but in certain areas, you can get lucky. Can go download Google Maps for a certain area easily.
Stayed 4 nights in Yellowstone, Old Faithful Cabins (pretty nice). There is a L2 EV charger about 100 yds. from the cabins. I was lucky to get one of the 2 spots twice. These are very well hidden. Only saw 1 other Tesla there charging. He said he drove around for 45 minutes trying to locate this charger.
Drove up thru the Southern Entrance. Jackson Hole was very cool (only Starbucks within 150 miles!) You have to drive thru Grand Teton Nat'l Park to Yellowstone via the South entrance. We didn't stay long in Grand Tetons, but we talk with a couple in Yellowstone that had just staying at the Grand Teton Lodge, which they enjoyed immensely (much less crowded and peaceful they said, and better hiking).

The closest Tesla SC is after Jackson is West Yellowstone. That little town was worth the 1/2 hr. detour. The SC is right next to a Animal Sanctuary which was well worth the $12. If you go, drive the 2 loops EARLY. More animals and less crowds. After about 12:00, roads can be very congested. In my opinion. 3 days was fine. I've read a week would be best, but we are early risers and after the third day, we'd seen about everything that was a "must see". Charging was easier than expected. Excellent Wh/mile, like 225, in Yellowstone. 30-45 miles max mph gets you great range. Could drive 2 days on a charge.

We drove up from San Diego thru Colorado, visiting my sister. Made for a long trip this way, but broke it up nicely. Could easily do the trip from San Diego thru the West Yellowstone Entrance in 2 days. Maybe fun to stop at Bryce/Zion if time. We drove back from Colorado in 2 days, 1150 miles, seemed very easy.
 
Just to add... I noticed while we were driving up through yellowstone from the Teton side... Traffic is much worse going the other direction once you get to grand prismatic... Seemed most of the folks were coming from the West Entrance, and the line got so long at grand prismatic, it backed up onto the main road, blocking traffic coming from the west entrance.... We drove on through with no issues, and this was around 2pm or so. The next day, when we came from the West Entrance, you really need to head into the park before 8am... Traffic backs up near Grand Prismatic around 9-10am. I'd recommend hitting Grand Prismatic first, then Old Faithful, becuase there is PLENTY of parking at Old Faithful, but the parking lot at Grand Prismatic is tiny.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Watts_Up
@GregW @avs007 Thnak you for all those trip tips and information.

- When there is no Cell coverage, what would the Tesla Display Map show in this case?​
- Would then Navigation On Autopilot not working or just hanging?​
- I imagine that FSD should be still working by detecting the side of the road and the posted speed signs?​
- When at a lodge, was the Cell or the WiFi network speed fine or basically unusable?​

I found under Yellowstone National Park Lodges the following cell coverage map, which seems to be still acurate?

Yellowstone - Cell Coverage .jpg
 
- When at a lodge, was the Cell or the WiFi network speed fine or basically unusable?​
I drove up from the South Entrance from Teton. I had no cell signal until I got to the intersection where Grand Village was... When I got there, both my AT&T and Verizon Phones had signal, and I started getting a barrage of text messages from our friends we were meeting up with.. I had AT&T signal when we were at Mammoth, as we were stopped along the road to relax in the river. My main issue with Verizon, is that even tho my Verizon phone had signal, it was never able to establish a data connection inside the park, whereas my AT&T phone was able to... When we were at the West Gate, my AT&T phone was able to pull down around 90mbps, but my Verizon phone was getting dial up speeds...
 
@avs007 thank you again for the information.

In general when I have issues with the Internet, I run an App like Speedtest.net

I noticed that most of the time the download was working, and even 1 Mps can be enough,​
but if the upload is hanging or almost showing zero, it is then impossible to use the Web or the Phone,​
and may be just text message could work.​

- I was wondering if the Tesla Display would be hanging by displaying no map at all?

Well, I will certainly add the Twilight Zone jingle to my play list and run it when I will enter inside the park... I got some chills already thinking about it !!!
 
@avs007 thank you again for the information.

In general when I have issues with the Internet, I run an App like Speedtest.net

I noticed that most of the time the download was working, and even 1 Mps can be enough,​
but if the upload is hanging or almost showing zero, it is then impossible to use the Web or the Phone,​
and may be just text message could work.​

- I was wondering if the Tesla Display would be hanging by displaying no map at all?

Well, I will certainly add the Twilight Zone jingle to my play list and run it when I will enter inside the park... I got some chills already thinking about it !!!
Yeah, I measured upload too... With AT&T at the westgate I was getting 20mbps upload. With verizon I was getting around 1mbps when I was in town, and near 0 everywhere else. When it had signal inside the park, I could only make calls and send texts. I couldn't use data. Whereas AT&T, when it had signal inside the park, everything worked.

As far as the Tesla goes... I didn't drive the tesla there, but I have taken it a few places with no signal... When it happened, I'm pretty sure the map still worked, it's just satellite and traffic view don't work, but don't quote me on that. Not sure about setting new destinations tho while it has no signal... But that's why I downloaded offline maps for the entire area on my phone.
 
As a test, maybe you can drive to an underground parking structure and see how the Tesla nav behaves? I'd test myself, but I don't have access anymore to any underground structures over here.
Yes, I noticed this issue inside some underground parking. I remember noticing a slash like this: " / " on top of the Network icon, on the top right.

But I didn't tried to play with the display map as I was thinking that the car would also don't know the GPS location.
I will check next time, also a similar situation would when driving inside a tunnel.
 
Last edited:
Yes, I noticed this issue inside some underground parking. I remember noticing a slash like this: " / " on top of the Network icon, on the top right.

But I didn't tried to play with the display map as I was thinking that the car would also don't know the GPS location.
I will check next time, also a similar situation would when driving inside a tunnel.
I didn't pay attention to my tesla in a tunnel, but I know my other cars it continues to track inside tunnels, probably because it knows the vehicle velocity and direction. Likewise, I've used it in my other cars inside a parking structure where there was no GPS, but the car rememebred where it was last, and tried to track while driving inside the structure using speed/compass.
 
  • Informative
Reactions: Watts_Up
@Watts_Up,
I think basic nav maps are stored in Tesla computer but with no traffic info, no voice to navigation function. I would rather rely on downloaded maps to a phone.
I don't have FSD, so can't comment on that. The cameras do detect and read the Roadside Speed Limits, so that helps.

Wi-Fi was weird. The Wi-Fi around the Old Faithful Lodge said not available. I trying to hook up to the Employee Wifi, which it said was a Secured, pass protected Wi-Fi. Basically I still hooked up without a password. Strange, but helpful with no real cell signal available.