Trip Recommendations/Advice? Interesting places to check out?

[camalaio]

Hey folks,

Will be travelling from Vernon BC (Canada) through to Montrose CO (USA) next week with our LR AWD Model 3. Drive will be split over two days. I have a few things on my mind.

1. We're not set on any particular route and are unfamiliar. Any to avoid or recommend? Especially in regards to weather etc.
2. Any notable detours or places to check out along the way? Parks and such are great.
3. Charging networks are different of course. What are the main ones I should set up ahead of time?
4. How much "mountain highway" winter driving is to be expected along this route, and are there related online resources I can check for road conditions, webcams, etc.?

There's quite a few states we'll be hitting portions of (Washington, Idaho, Utah, maybe even a smidge of Oregon and Montana).

We'll have a CHAdeMO adapter with us as well. It's actually difficult to cross the Canada/US border without it unless a large detour is taken. I'm not worried about charging once we get to Montrose, especially since a CHAdeMO station is only 30 mins away or so.

Are we crazy to do this trip in Winter?

Any responses are appreciated, thanks!

Note: Thread is intentionally duplicated in Mountain/Southwest forum.

 

[marksvend]

I’ve done Seattle to SLC and Banff in the winter. You’re not crazy at all. You just have to plan for more charging than the car trip planner recommends – especially with winter tires or roof rack.

Always watch the estimated arrival percentage and slow down if necessary. Book hotels with chargers if possible.

I also use the A Better Route Planner app to do realistic winter efficiency trip planning. Now it can connect to the car and determine the “calibrated reference consumption” while driving for a second opinion of how high you need to charge at each stop. It can also fall back to CHAdeMO or L2 stations if necessary.

Also, make sure to look for recent check-ins on PlugShare for CHAdeMO stations, and have backups planned in case they don’t work.

 

[JasontheBeaver]

I've always liked Palouse Falls State Park but that might be a bit out of your way.
Otherwise, the drive down "Old Spiral Highway" off US-95 into Lewiston/Clarkston is a great view.

 

[camalaio]

I’ve done Seattle to SLC and Banff in the winter. You’re not crazy at all. You just have to plan for more charging than the car trip planner recommends – especially with winter tires or roof rack.

Always watch the estimated arrival percentage and slow down if necessary. Book hotels with chargers if possible.

I also use the A Better Route Planner app to do realistic winter efficiency trip planning. Now it can connect to the car and determine the “calibrated reference consumption” while driving for a second opinion of how high you need to charge at each stop. It can also fall back to CHAdeMO or L2 stations if necessary.

Also, make sure to look for recent check-ins on PlugShare for CHAdeMO stations, and have backups planned in case they don’t work.

I'm one of the noisy people about winter range impacts, so thankfully we'll be somewhat prepared for that. I'm using A Better Route Planner currently, but never thought to connect it to the car. That's probably a good plan on this trip, I'll look into that. Thanks!

I actually won't be able to use L2 stations unfortunately. I recently lost the adapter and unless I can happen to pick one up at a Service Centre along the way, it's definitely not going to ship in time.

I've always liked Palouse Falls State Park but that might be a bit out of your way.
Otherwise, the drive down "Old Spiral Highway" off US-95 into Lewiston/Clarkston is a great view.

It's only out of our way if it adds more than a few hours IMO. That route is essentially straight down from Coeur d'Alene which I was thinking of coercing A Better Route Planner to go through already, I'll see what impact this has. Thanks for the suggestion!

 

[playoutside]

I drove from Denver to Seattle exactly 12 months ago in my performance Model 3, I had no issues.

Just make sure you have all season (or winter tires). I had snow chains but didn’t need to use them on any of the snowy passes.

Expect to get lots of rock chips unless you have paint protection film.

I did the same trip in July. I never had an issue charging. Unlike the I-5 corridor, there aren’t too many Teslas in Eastern WA/OR, ID, and UT. I never say more than 4 at one SC and usually it was 0 or 1 other car.

 

[PLUS EV]

You can do this trip completely with superchargers if you go Vernon>Kelowna>Spokane>Butte>SLC>Green River>Grand Junction>Montrose. That will be by far the fastest route in a Tesla. You will need to drive carefully and hope the road conditions are decent for the Kelowna>Spokane leg. Have a backup plan for that one just in case.

I would never go on a long trip without a J1772 adapter. Ask around on a local Tesla group and hopefully someone can loan you one.

Yellowstone would be a reasonable detour in summer, but many of the roads are closed this time of year, so might not be feasible.

Good luck with the trip. One nice thing is there are many different options that all take around 21.5 hours of driving time so you can use a different route on the way back. Definitely play around with Google Maps and check out the different possibilities.

 

[camalaio]

I would never go on a long trip without a J1772 adapter. Ask around on a local Tesla group and hopefully someone can loan you one.

Yellowstone would be a reasonable detour in summer, but many of the roads are closed this time of year, so might not be feasible.

Good luck with the trip. One nice thing is there are many different options that all take around 21.5 hours of driving time so you can use a different route on the way back. Definitely play around with Google Maps and check out the different possibilities.

I don't like that I'm going without an adapter, but we don't have any local groups to ask for a loaner. I'll be going through Salt Lake City on Monday, apparently the service centres pretty much always have stock of the adapters so I'll pick one up then.

Good note on Yellowstone, I had thought that might be a nice detour even right now! And yeah, we'll most likely take a different route back. Nice to have options.