Cliff Notes of the Journey
I don’t have the time, patience, or memory to recap my six day road trip to PA in exquisite detail. Often I will try to write as I am on the road to make the process easier. Because I spent a lot of that free time documenting and making videos about the V11 I did not have any spare time to blog stuff.
I pulled out a little after 7AM on Thursday morning. My route was not what it normally would be for a road trip where I would head directly north on I-75. Instead I headed across Alligator Alley to pick up the Inmotion V11 demo wheel from Mickey. Once I was there we rode around and talked for a little bit so it put me at a time deficit that affected the rest of my travel for the day.
Up until the point, the farthest I ever went in the Tesla was the Orlando area, this was my first interstate road trip. The car makes the process pretty painless as long as you don’t mind the 30 minute breaks to supercharge. The roughly 1200 mile trip required 7 supercharging stops to complete the journey. It really isn’t as big of a deal as it may seem as you are going to normally be stopping for bathroom and food breaks anyway. I tried to combine these together wherever possible.
Most of the superchargers were nearby retail locations so I had options. There was one in particular that had no amenities whatsoever. The superchargers were located in an overflow parking lot of an airport. I had to pay to park there (only 1$) but there was nothing around. I had to pee like crazy so my restroom at that location was the woods nearby. I also spent some time charging riding around the V11, some of which I recorded.
I ended my first day of travel in Santee, SC. I stayed at a Holiday Inn that was overpriced for what it offered. Despite driving until 10PM I only had covered about half of the miles to PA, due to my late start. Despite the long day I was still more or less enjoying the adventure of the road trip. That excitement wore out about halfway through the second day.
My drive on Friday was going ok until I got closer to the Washington DC area. I became ensnared in seemingly endless traffic that pushed me to the brink. I saw at least a half dozen accidents during that time period. When I started off the day the car predicted my arrival in Lenhartsville would be around 6:30PM. I didn’t actually get there until after 9PM Friday night. I was greeted by my dad, stepmom, Patrick and Nico who drove in from Pittsburgh. I immediately plugged the Tesla in to an outlet in dad’s garage. I wasn’t thrilled when I saw it was only charging at 1 KW rate which is dreadfully slow, even for 110 volt power. For reference sake at a supercharger I am pulling power as fast as 175KW.
My late arrival meant we only hung out briefly before packing it in for bed. Two days of driving past 9PM in a row had left me pretty worn out. Of course I said hi to Clara their dog. It felt strange and sad to not have Maggie there as well, who passed away recently. She was always a very fun part of the dad visitation experience for the last 15 years.
I slept well Friday night . On Saturday after downing a bowl of cereal dad and I went out to supercharge the Tesla, it was his first ride in one. The closest supercharger was about 15 miles away in Allentown. Dad was impressed with the way the car drove and just how quickly supercharging occurs. After we were done I grabbed a Dunkin Donuts coffee and we made a stop at dad’s newspaper source before heading home.
Patrick and I did some EUC riding later that morning. He had brought his Segway S1 that I bought him a couple years ago. He has gotten proficient at riding since then. We rode the big grassy areas of the property before heading down the gravel road.
As we traveled Patrick spotted a steep washed out stone path up the middle of a cornfield. He said that would be a good test of the V11 that I was riding. I agreed and took a shot at climbing it. Points of the road were extremely steep, steeper than I have ever ridden on an EUC. I had to stop and start a couple times during the climb but I did complete it. It was an unexpected but pretty cool test of the power of this new suspension wheel.
Prior to Todd’s party I had run out to get a pair of headphones to help me edit video during the trip. Walmart was my closest option. As I was waiting to make a left turn into the shopping center I all of sudden feel and hear impact to the car from the rear. WTF??? I look in the rear view mirror and see a Ford Explorer pressed up against the rear of my Tesla.
I shot out of my car, angry. I approach the Ford and see an older woman behind the wheel, staring straight ahead. She seemed a bit dazed. Seeing it was an old woman took a bit of my aggression away. I asked her what happened. She continued to stare ahead and just said “I don’t know….”
I told her we can pull up into the shopping center so we weren’t blocking traffic. She said nothing but I assumed she understood. The turning arrow went green and I pulled up into the parking lot of a McD’s. The woman did not follow, instead she just stayed at the light and let it turn red. In the meantime I got out of the car to survey the damage. I felt somewhat relieved when all I could see was a small nick in the paint from the front license plate screw.
I walked over to the edge of the hill waiting, so the woman could clearly see me. The turn arrow went green and she pulled into the shopping center. But instead of coming into the lot where I was she continued driving, right out the other side and back onto the roads. As she drove by me I stood there with my arms out in disbelief, this old lady hit and run me. At that moment I did a very fast effort/value calculation. I could have jumped in my Tesla and tried to track her down but she already had a large head start on me and I could not tell which direction she went once she got out of my sight. I factored in that the damage was very minor and the time/effort that would be involved with chasing her down and/or getting local police involved. I did not have that sort of time since Todd’s party was that afternoon. I decided to let the old confused woman go without chase. I could only hope karma bites her in the ass at some point.
Todd’s party was scheduled to start at 3PM. I originally wanted my visit to be a surprise but my presence was revealed by my stupidity. I had posted some pictures to InstaGram which I didn’t think Todd was a member of. However I didn’t think about how I had my account set to automatically post pictures to Facebook as well, which Todd saw. I felt dumb but oh well, it’s the thought that counts I guess.
The weather forecast was looking iffy with rain. The idea of having 30+ people indoors was not something that appealed to me at all and I had my mask packed for that situation. Instead the rain stopped and most of the party was held in a mix of sun/cloud outdoors. Todd’s girlfriend Mindy really put effort into the event, having it catered with two large tents and ample decorations everywhere. Although the element of surprise was lost Todd was still glad to see me.
I did not know most of the people at the party which was not unexpected. I spent most of the time by the pool area hanging with my sister Meg and her family. Their two little girls are beyond cute. There was copious amounts of food and drink available. I only had three or four drinks over the roughly 3-4 hours I was there, conscious that I had to drive the Tesla home to Lenhartsville.
I intentionally tried to limit my interactions with others as nobody was wearing a mask outside of one person I saw briefly. Being outdoors and spread out helped some but I still could not get away from the feeling that this was not the best thing to be doing during a pandemic that is speeding up instead of slowing down.
I did get to also interact with Oakley and Bailey the two huge Alaskan Malamutes. They were in the back yard instead of their crates which was nice. Unfortunately with their shaggy coats being designed for frigid climates instead of humid PA summer, both dogs looked very hot and uncomfortable.
On Sunday morning I wanted to go find a shoo fly pie to take back home for Cindy. My dad told me a place called Dietrich’s Meats had them and was relatively nearby. I had never heard of the place before but evidently it is a big deal.
When I walked into the store it was pretty busy with people mulling about looking at the various meat products including pickled pig snout and feet to name a couple. I quickly found the shoo fly pies and grabbed two, one for us and one for Patrick who requested one. As I was waiting to check out an old lady, who I later found out was named Verna, was trying to get me to buy some peach pies. She told me they were just out of the oven and were delicious. I told her I am sure they are delicious but all I needed was the shoo fly for now. My dad and Teresa said Verna always is trying to sell more pies. They also said people drive in from far away as New York to patronize Dietrich’s. I guess their meat is just that good, too bad my diet doesn’t include most of what they sell.
Later in the day my dad, Pat and Nico went on a little trip in the Tesla. The first stop was Wanamaker’s General Store, a super quaint and old fashioned general store. In some ways it reminded me of Brightbills, the only store in Gouglerville, where I grew up, where I bought most of my baseball card collection.
I bought my only non-shoo fly souvenirs from the trip there, they had an interesting combination of stuff there including conventional grocery items and a sandwich shop, which we ordered our lunch from. We enjoyed our lunch outside on a picnic table while we watched an old passenger train that is a tourist attraction load up and roll out. It was an unexpected little experience that I really liked.
Dad then steered us to an ice cream shop that literally seemed to be in the middle of nowhere. The narrow road twisted up through the woods, opening up to a farm that just happened to have an ice cream shoppe. It again was a very cool place with delicious homemade ice cream. The farm also houses several THOUSAND chickens. They sell millions of eggs per year.
We made arrangements to meet up with Todd and his family for dinner at Beverly Hills Tavern where my niece Caroline works. She was working that night so it was a way to see her before I pushed off for Florida the next morning. I had not been to Beverly Hills in probably 25 years. They had added a huge outdoor seating area that I never saw before. Thanks to covid 19 the place was only about half full. They required everyone to wear a mask if they left their table, which is something I guess.
It was nice to have the gang altogether before we all headed back to where we came from. Patrick and Nico where driving straight to Pittsburgh after the meal. I was getting up at 5AM for a very early departure as well. Todd thanked me for coming up and we said goodbye to everyone else. I have made two trips to PA within 6 months, a rarity that is unlikely to be repeated anytime soon.
I tried to get my stuff mostly packed and ready to go Sunday night so I could get out as early as possible Monday morning. Since my car had been plugged in for awhile, even with the dreadfully slow charge rate, it was full and ready to go by the time I left at 6AM. I said goodbye to my dad and stepmom. Even though it was a lightning quick two day visit it felt like I crammed a lot of memories into that relatively short time period.
The drive south over the next two days went dramatically better than the way up. I hit no appreciable traffic and thanks to my “steering wheel balancer” I was able to more or less experience FSD (full self driving) on the interstates for the vast majority of the drive. It felt like I was in a one person train. I pushed hard the first day, getting all the way to Kingsland Georgia. I used a different charging strategy on the way back that saved time. Instead of charging my car almost to full, I charged it just enough to ensure I could make it to the next supercharging destination. Doing so really helped shave off some charge time along the way.
Getting so far on Monday allowed me to get home by 2PM on Tuesday which was great. I arrived to a new mower sitting in the garage which was just dropped off a few minutes prior to my arrival. Elsa and Cindy both gave me a very warm greeting which was much appreciated. Cindy showed me our bedroom which she had repainted while I was gone. The new color is a big change but I like it.
From the time I got home until bedtime felt like a big blur. I was buzzing around the house tending to all sorts of things. Even when I stopped to eat dinner and watch some shows with Cindy my mind was still processing all that yet needed to be done over the next few days. The trip was fun adventure but as is always the case, it was great to be home with all things familiar with our little family unit in place. If you want to see a video of the drive up, here you go.