Last weekend my buddy Roger and I were all set to attempt to see a SpaceX launch here in California. SpaceX’s California launches are fairly rare, so Roger took off work and we started to pack.
Unfortunately SpaceX cancelled the launch while we were packing. We talked about it and decided to make the trip anyway. We already had the hotel room and the time off.
It’s a lot of driving, but I was really confused by the online descriptions of viewing locations and what was visible from where. Going there and looking would make future planning a lot easier.
We got to Ocean Park Beach near Lompac and this is what we saw:
I was hoping to at least see the rocket so we scanned the area. Sadly there are massive forest fires in California right now and the air is filled with smoke so with the naked eye and binoculars it was very hard to tell exactly at what we were looking. I enhanced the picture above and did this (incorrect) analysis:
I immediately googled to find an image of the rocket on that site and boy was I wrong about the scale. You can see the thing that I suspected was the rocket at the very foot of the rocket:
Basically we would have definitely been able to see the rocket had it been there.
Another reason for the trip was get out on the road in our Model-3 Tesla. I wanted to show it off to Roger and this would be the first intense road trip I’ve taken in the car. I had driven it to Lake Tahoe, but that was a leisure trip and we took our time. Because of our schedules this trip would be down and back in 36 hours. Here’s how it worked out.
Okay, here’s my analysis of the trip:
Heading South:
https://goo.gl/maps/SXq1cNNGP642
320 miles, 5.5 hours of driving
Heading North:
https://goo.gl/maps/wgugUQwVoJ72
336 miles, 6 hours of driving
Total: 656 miles, 11.5 hours of driving
Supercharging
Gilroy__________$ 4.68Madonna Inn_____$12.48Atascadero______$ 8.32Salinas_________$ 7.28----------------------Total___________$32.76
$0.0499 per mile
First, that’s a ton of driving for a 36 hour trip. Thanks to Roger for driving most of the way back! Thanks to the car for driving most of the way everywhere. It was a crazy experience because both of us almost peed our pants on multiple occasions. As great as the car is at driving itself, IT IS OFTEN TERRIFYING! Ha. What can I say. Humans just aren’t used to having their cars steer for them at 72 miles an hour in bumper to bumper traffic on a 3 lane freeway.
My receipt for the supercharging does not include how long we waited. We didn’t wait for every charge. At the Madonna Inn we charged while at the hotel. I think the longest wait we had was probably 20 or 30 minutes. We walked over to Starbucks and I got a soy latte. We walked back and left, so however long it takes to walk 4 blocks and order coffee. We probably waited about an hour and 15 minutes total.
Here’s what’s so nuts about the above. Tesla charges a premium (a mark up) on the electricity to supercharge. It’s the most expensive way to charge your car. And EVEN THEN it’s half the cost of a 40 MPG gas car (and almost no cars actually get 40 MPG).
As a reference, the current average gas price at the moment is $3.96. If we use a car that gets 40 mpg, that works out to $0.09235 per mile or $60.58 total. The national average fuel efficiency is around 23.6 MPG. That is $0.1564 per mile or $102.47 for the trip.
I’m not saying that you’re going to save money buying a Tesla. We paid a lot and Tesla has yet to offer the $36,000 version of our car. But what I am suggesting (strongly) is that the crap you hear about EVs not being good for the environment or cheaper to operate is just nonsense. Someone tells you that please tell them what happened here.
