Hampton Inn & Suites Christiana Newark – My ActiveE Made Me Accidentally Environmental

Here, There, and EVerywhere – Day 18

A quick note of thanks to the Beatles for inspiring the title for this series of posts. This is the eighteenth in a series of posts written about our trip that will be published four weeks to the day of the trip.

Missed Day 17, click here.

Day 18 – Drive on Tuesday, May 19, 2015

Hampton Inn and Suites in Christiana/Newark

We were prepared for a vampire loss overnight of -10 to +1 range, we found that the cool rain provided us with the upper end of the expected range. We gained a mile from the time we parked last night to the time that we decided to roll out.

I don’t have anything to add to this hotel location except to highlight the fact that this was the only hotel on the trip, so far, that we have visited for a second time. That, in itself, should be a positive endorsement.

We now stayed in Delaware twice that we were beginning to wonder whether we should start a corporation or something.

It’s interesting to see how empty the hotel looks from the window of our room. This place was packed last night. People really clear out early.

Newark Supercharger

With around a 3 mile difference, the drive from the hotel to the supercharger was quick.

The Delaware Welcome Center seems to be a very popular stop for buses heading on field trips (Washington, D.C. perhaps?). While we were sitting and charging at the location at least a dozen tour buses filled with teenagers had stopped by at this Welcome Center.

The Delaware Welcome Center is pretty full during this time of day and if you’re hoping to get some Starbucks, be prepared to wait. Even with two locations inside the Welcome Center, the number of people in line gets quite long.

Not sure with what we can expect at Hershey, PA, we range charged. The many routes to Hershey, PA from the Delaware Supercharger took us through many off-Interstate routes, and not knowing the area, we just randomly picked one. This time, on a lark, we thought to give Google Maps a try and used the turn by turn directions provided by Google’s iPhone app. We also put in our destination on Tesla’s in-car navigation, but decided to take the route that looked like it used the least amount of Interstates.

With that in mind, we went off to go to Hershey’s Chocolate World.

The recommended routes to Hershey Chocolate World on Google Maps and from Tesla Navigation were remarkably different. The Model S first tried to get us to take a Route North then West, whereas the Google Maps one had us go Southwest and then North. We stayed on the Google Maps and we were off the Interstate rather quickly. We got off the Interstate in Delaware and entered the Maryland border on surface streets/highways?

Not sure what this meant when we passed it, so we went ahead and searched for it on Google. We figured that it had nothing to do with fish & chips, and we were right. Apparently on some rural routes, its a method for repairing the road using chips of rock with oil.

The sign was followed with a progress at your own risk disclaimer which we found unnerving, but unsure of what we would encounter over alternate methods, we pressed on. The sealing method must have done its job properly because we were lucky enough not to have chips of rock flying free on us on this portion of the drive. That would have been irritating, to say the least.

Somehow we found ourselves crossing into Pennsylvania though we did not capture the welcome sign into the state this time.

Not really very knowledgeable of Pennsylvania geography, somethings lead me to think that we’re in Amish Country. Like the appearance of this sign that I was unfamiliar with.

Ooh, Cows…

That confirms it, we are in Amish Country.

It was a rather scenic drive. However, our friends at Google Maps navigation did try to send us to a closed road that we decided to turn around and use the Model S navigation about 30 miles into the drive.

Another set of cows.

We ran into another sign to remind us that we’re sharing the road with horse powered buggys.

A few more signs that remind us that we’re in Amish country.

This place looked to be a recreation rather than an actual Amish location. Having chocolate on one’s goal compelled us to press on.

Hershey, PA

And we find ourselves entering the town of Hershey, PA. A few signs that remind us of the importance of chocolate to the town and its history. Just like our experience in Maine, these guys are so friendly that they had TWO welcome to Hershey signs.

The one that had a chocolate bar in it.

And the other one that was all “official” and like.

A lot of the signs about town were chocolate related. Like the movie house below, it’s called the CocoaPlex.

Or the Cocoa Motel. Seeing that we’re strictly focused on staying at Hotels with an H and not an M. We skipped that spot. 😉

Tasty reading at the Hershey Public Library.

The town definitely has embraced the chocolate factory, take a look at the street lights/lamp posts.

Kind of a tight underpass toward the Hershey Chocolate World.

It’s interesting to contrast the drive into and around Hershey, PA with my other experience in the town of Slough, UK. Slough is the UK headquarters for Hershey’s competitor Mars, Incorporated (of M&M’s fame.) Aside from the tell-tale sweet smell of chocolate in Slough Trading Estate, the town didn’t seem to celebrate the Mars Bar or any ties to the candy as Hershey, PA does to the Hershey Bar. I would have enjoyed trying to visit either the Left Twix or Right Twix factory.

After this brief drive through the town, we enter Hershey Chocolate World.

Hershey Chocolate World

Hershey Chocolate World is a combination attraction and store. The thought to stop and visit Hershey, PA was borne from our initial drive through PA on Day 9. As we drove into PA, we thought how “cool” it would be to go to Hershey, PA. No real planning or anything. Since it seemed to be away from Tesla Supercharger highway, we dismissed it until we can figure out a way to it. And I was glad that we did.

Our later research into a visit to Hershey Chocolate World yielded us the information about four Level 2 J1772 Chargepoint chargers that were listed on Plugshare.com. Additionally, it seems that Hershey, PA also has other chargers installed throughout the town. So, armed with a bit of information, we were able to incorporate this drive to the return.

The theme park was closed when we visited, but we weren’t planning on going there anyway, so we headed into the Hershey’s Chocolate World store.

The selection of Hershey’s chocolate was incredible.

White, Milk, or Dark?

I was disappointed that they did not stock any of the international Kit Kat flavors.

There were some attractions and we chose the free one, the “factory tour.” I have this is quotes because we didn’t actually get to see the factory folks doing their work, just a bunch of exhibits describing the chocolate making process. However, it was a fun little ride and diversion.

It turned out that the Factory Tour is a ride.

Hershey’s chocolate starts with milk, and milk comes from cows, so the tour starts with introducing us to the cows.

So, we follow the tour to the various steps of the chocolate making process.

No matter where you go, it seems that they really like Kiss shaped lighting around Hershey, PA.

When we were done visiting the Hershey Chocolate World, it looks like it was just us charging here on this particular visit. I figure that in the peak season, these chargers will more likely be used more often. The parking lot was fairly empty.

We rolled out with 200 miles on our rated range and our first Level 2 charge of the trip. This means that we added 28 miles of rated range for the 100 minutes that we were inside the Hershey Chocolate World. That’s a rate of 16.8 rated range miles per hour to charge at these J1772 stations.

Taking the opportunity to check out destination charging and making an entry for the beta of the (now released) Teslarati App for iOS, we headed to the AACA Museum, about 2 miles away from Hershey Chocolate World.

AACA Museum, Hershey, PA

The drive was uphill, but short, so we used about 3 miles of rated range to get to the AACA Museum on the route toward Hagerstown Supercharger.

The chargers at this location were located in the driveway by the entrance to the museum. We plugged in to see what the rate is and to get another “places you’ve charged” into the Model S. Our experience at this location nets a 40A feed and not the 80A that we expected from these Tesla High Power Wall Charger (HPWC).

Just ahead of the Tesla HPWC is the Hershey Kissmobile. With Hugs, Almonds, and Kisses making up the main portions of the vehicle.

You can actually see our car charging on one of the two HPWCs just behind me and the Hershey Kissmobile.

Since we’ve been visiting many a car museum lately, (Nethercutt Collection and the Petersen Museum collection that was at the President Reagan Library and Museum) we decided to skip on actually going to view the exhibits in the museum.

We charged enough to get the 3 miles that we lost getting to the museum and continued on our way.

Hagerstown Supercharger

We sent notices to a few of the Maryland guys, but they were unavailable. So, we find ourselves in Hagerstown by ourselves again. Will just have to meet these guys “in real life” on another trip.

We decided not to eat at the Hagerstown Supercharger location this time. I did notice that we just passed 40,000 miles upon arrival at the Hagerstown Supercharger. 40,004 miles, to be precise. Long time readers know how much I enjoyed documenting “significant mileage” milestones.

When we set out to go to Hershey today, we discussed making the decision to go West and what route to take by the time we finished charging at Hagerstown. We decided to skip going South and Hagerstown, MD and Somerset, PA were the two superchargers that we will pass before we decide to continue back the same direction that we took to head East, or to take the just opened I-70 route.

The completion of the St Charles, MO charger on I-70 had made it possible to cross Missouri to Independence. After the completion of this supercharger, more aggressive drivers have been able to do this with one range charge. In fact, my former co-pilot on the Tour de Tesla 2013, Jim, tried to complete this in the April 2015 as an attempt via his much quicker “EV Cannonball Run“, he actually got a boost from @LithieTWTesla via an HPWC 30 miles toward Independence, MO from St Charles, MO that they share on Plugshare as opposed to our more leisurely roadtrip.

Heading to @LithieTWTesla to charge up a few extra miles just to be cautious #teslamotors

— EV Cannonball (@EVCannonball) April 22, 2015

So, we reached Hagerstown, discussed it and decided to add the I-70 route to our plans. I don’t normally correspond with @LithieTWTesla so, figured we would make a stop closer to the middle, it looks like Columbia, MO have some options.

We finally caught the state line crossing back into Pennsylvania on this part of the drive.

My wife decided to take a few more pictures of the car and the view from the side mirror again.

We headed into the tunnels through the Allegheny Mountain pass here. Though, we missed the A in this shot.

We caught the whole sign, but the mirror image since we shot this picture through the side mirror.

Some compelling pictures of the sunset again.

Got a better shot of the windmills in Pennsylvania on this drive. I don’t understand why folks are against these things. Considering the alternative, I would say that they’re pretty cool.

The dusk offers us with the some of the most compelling shots of the trip.

And we find ourselves at Somerset location again.

Somerset Supercharger

At this location with a much darker time of day. Or dusk as it is more appropriate to call it now.

The long dusk period stayed with us as we departed Somerset on our new route Westward on I-70.

Under the heading of, we’ve never slept in… Oh wait, we’ve never BEEN to West Virginia before, we decided to find a place near to or on the way to the Triadelphia supercharger.

It turns out that this location is at a hotel, so we just booked there.

Spotted on the way to Triadelphia is California… Not the same one, apparently. 😉

And we find ourselves at another state line welcome sign.

Hampton Inn & Suites, Triadelphia

We chose to stay at the Hampton Inn & Suites, Triadelphia because the supercharger is located at the same place. We make it a point, when we can, to stay and sponsor those businesses that have decided to support the supercharger network. Besides, it’s most convenient to roll out of bed, and supercharge while getting ready for the day.

So, we checked in for the evening with 117 miles of Rated Range left, and a new state to add to the list of states that we’ve visited. At this point, the list of states that we’ve never visited is quite small.

Go on to Day 19. Click here.

Here, There, and EVerywhere – Day 17

A quick note of thanks to the Beatles for inspiring the title for this series of posts. This is the seventeenth in a series of posts written about our trip that will be published four weeks to the day of the trip.

Missed Day 16, click here.

Day 17 – Drive on Monday, May 18, 2015

Everyday we like to set out goals. One of my aunts in New Jersey is celebrating her birthday today. So, we decided to head down to Whiting, NJ to visit her and then continue on our way. We’ve decided NOT to go to the South on this trip as the weather reports don’t seem to agree with us. We’re thinking of positioning ourselves to get to Hershey, PA tomorrow and are looking to find ourselves either in Hershey, PA or on the way to Hershey, PA from New Jersey, depending on how today’s familial parts go.

However, before we get there, the goal is to get to Whiting, NJ.

First statistic we check for is to see what we gained by plugging in 110V/8A. Looks like we gained 27 miles overnight. Not bad. Those miles are enough to get us to the Edison Supercharger.

On the way to Edison, NJ. We spotted another Random NJ Model S. It was raining, trying to follow my cousin in his car in a caravan, and I was in unfamiliar territory, so I may not have been as friendly on the road.

Edison Supercharger

We took the other set of four from the last time we charged.

There were already two Model S in the other set and didn’t want to split anyone’s charge. And because I was curious to see if there was a difference in charge speed from this set than the other set. I didn’t perceive a difference.

Check out the “alien car” that I caught in the panoramic shot.

We stayed in Edison for a near maximum charge as we know we were going to probably be giving a ride to my uncle and aunt when we get to Whiting and wanted to not have to worry about the charge. The current New Jersey superchargers are all further from the New Jersey shore and Whiting is closer to the shore than the chargers. Considering the fact that New Jersey already has three supercharge locations in the state, it is quite confusing not to have one close to the shore. Atlantic City, Long Beach Island, Tom’s River, those would be good locations for the first shore-side New Jersey supercharger.

Originally, the navigation to Whiting, had us taking the Garden State Parkway, but by the time we were done charging, it changed to route us through the NJ Turnpike. The Turnpike would have allowed us a route through Hamilton Marketplace again for a 30 mile boost, but decided to skip it as we had enough charge to make it to my aunt’s, drive the car around a bit, and then get to Newark, DE and beyond. Besides, we’re now going through some superchargers and areas that we’ve already covered for our entries in the beta of the (now released) Teslarati App for iOS.

So, we headed to Whiting, NJ.

Whiting, NJ

Well, we did it again. I got confused by the exits to get to Whiting from the NJ Turnpike that I ended up having to take the next exit. Now, it’s not as bad as the 15 mile one-way that we experienced in Vermont on the way to Ice Cream (and neither was I distracted by any Bear, Deer, or Moose signs). I think I’ll blame it on jughandle turns.

For those unfamiliar with jughandle turns, aside from the Wikipedia link that I embedded, I’d like to define it. The jughandle turn is an oddity that seems to exist primarily in New Jersey. As I understand it, the theory is to take folks that would be making a left or U-turn and force them to make those turns along with traffic that is crossing a highway.

Either way, the exit we were originally meant to exit looked like a rest-stop to me that I ended up bypassing it. Luckily, we charged enough to do a LOT in Whiting and beyond, and it was no big deal. Our original route on the NJ Turnpike was supposed to take us 55 miles, so, it looks like we had another 15 mile diversion.

With 175 miles of range left we really didn’t need to charge, but I believe that it was a novelty for my aunt and uncle to see us plug a car into their house. Besides I do like to collect “places that we’ve charged” and it’s even cooler when it’s thousands of miles away from home.

We didn’t really do much driving, we drove around with a few of my cousins, a couple of my aunts and uncles in the Model S. We were able to charge at the full 12A at my aunt and uncle’s house. While we were visiting, we decided that we would just spend the night at the same hotel in Christiana/Newark, DE as we were impressed with how comfortable that hotel was.

We left my aunt and uncle’s house with 188 miles of rated range heading toward the Hampton Inn and Suites in Christiana/Newark, DE. That means that we gained 13 miles of rated range having birthday dinner.

Hampton Inn and Suites Christiana – Newark

We checked back in to the Hampton Inn and Suites Christiana – Newark. This was the same hotel that we stayed at on Day 9.

It was raining when we got here and we checked in with 104 Rated Miles on rated range and we know that we’re only three miles to the Newark Supercharger. Additionally, even if we lost the 10 miles that was the worst vampire loss that we experienced earlier in the trip, we will be fine.

In the parking lot of this Hampton Inn was a fellow Model S traveler, who I found out on TMC’s Random Model S thread was TMC user EdA‘s wife’s Red Model S.

So, a fine few days of Random Model S sightings for us and we made sure to report it on the thread on TMC. Now I had a few goals in mind for this trip, and one of those was to “be” the spotted Model S on that thread. So, as we head West on the return part of our trip, I’m a little disappointed that we have yet to make the Random Model S spotting thread. How often do folks spot a California Model S around here anyway?

Oh well, time for bed, dreaming of Hershey’s Chocolate on the next day’s drive.

Go on to Day 18. Click here.

Here, There, and EVerywhere – Day 09

A quick note of thanks to the Beatles for inspiring the title for this series of posts. This is the ninth in a series of posts written about our trip that will be published four weeks to the day of the trip.

Missed Day 8, click here.

Day 9 – Drive on Sunday, May 10, 2015

Happy Mothers’ Day. Today’s goal is to make it to my other cousin’s home at Randolph, NJ, however, we had too much fun visiting my cousin in Ohio that we got a late start to the day.

Copley, OH

My cousin finally got to take a spin in the the Model S before we rolled out for our trip today. Needless to say, he was floored. I reminded him that we have an S85 and not the P85D, and that the acceleration and torque that he experienced is more “reserved” than the top of the line Model S. I even reminded him that the Cleveland-Lyndhurst Sales and Service Center that we went to a few days before had an abundance of CPO Model S in stock, ready for delivery. So, here’s to hoping that another Model S joins the extended family.

For some reason, we reset the start of day mileage. Mental error, I guess.

One thing that stands out to this California driver, since Illinois, is the abundance of toll roads that one needs to traverse through to get from point A to point B (and many points in between.) Growing up in Southern California, tolls are the exception and not the rule. Additionally, most locations in Southern California now do not take cash for the toll roads. One must use the transponders to use these toll roads. In the East, it seems that most of the toll roads still take cash, and we opted NOT to sign up for any of the toll transponders as we didn’t know where to get it, nor how to refill and the like. Some states toll authority allowed credit cards, while others were cash only. So, I would suggest that California (or other Western drivers who are traveling East from Illinois onward) carry sufficient cash to cover the toll roads.

After driving over 2,500 miles in a few days, the drive of less than a hundred miles seems rather quick. So quick that just like that, we’re almost at the PA border.

Cranberry Supercharger

The Cranberry Supercharger was a bit of a distance from the Turnpike. I would surmise that we drove a few miles away from the exit to get to the supercharger. Followed the Navigation to the supercharger but it was sending us to the wrong side of the street. It’s way in the back of the Residence Inn. The last supercharger was blocked by some containers that the hotel seems to be using. It doesn’t seem to be a permanent installation, so I wouldn’t worry about it.

I didn’t know what to expect to the Somerset Supercharger, so we went back to our baseline for the trip to add at least 100 miles on top of the minimum required to reach the next charger, at Somerset, PA.

On the way to the Somerset Supercharger, I was pleasantly surprised by a familiar site – a 30A Blink Network Charger at the Oakmont Plum Rest Area.

Now, this was a stop we made because I had a craving for coffee, and this location had a Starbucks, so it was a pleasant coincidence that there was an EV charger on the Turnpike. We didn’t “need” a charge, so we didn’t plug in.

Good for you Pennsylvania.

Somerset Supercharger

This was a supercharger that required an exit from the Pennsylvania Turnpike. The location was close to the exit and by the Wendy’s. Since we were a stop away from Maryland, I thought to send a few tweets to some of my EV contacts from Twitter to see if they wanted to meet-up at Hagerstown. Since it was Mother’s Day, I figured that the chances were slim to none, but decided to give it a try anyway.

If your car is dirty from the trip, beside the supercharger is a car wash.

This location might be a good place to clean the car, if you’re on a long roadtrip. On the drive to Hagerstown, MD, we saw a cluster of windmills. So, good for you for that Pennsylvania.

After leaving the Somerset, PA supercharger, on the way to Hagerstown, MD we reached 38,000 miles on this drive.

Longtime readers know how much I enjoy posting about Significant Mileage.

I made a mental note that “you know that you’re East when a few hundred miles of the drive has you going through several states,” as we pass the border into Maryland.

Hagerstown Supercharger

This supercharger is located in an outlet mall. When we pulled into the supercharger, I checked Twitter, and, as expected folks had prior engagements in Maryland. I’ll just reach out again the next time we’re back through here.

Arriving here around dinner time had us look for what our dining options are. We opted to go to the Longhorn Steakhouse at the entrance of the Hagerstown Outlet Mall, not quite the Maryland crab cakes I was hoping to have, but sustenance nonetheless.

With a full car and full driver, we headed out of Hagerstown, MD for the next stop on our drive. The next supercharger in Maryland is in Bethesda, MD, however, we’re on our way to New Jersey and could get to the Newark, DE supercharger without a stop in Bethesda. So, we went toward Newark, DE.

You know what time it is when state line crossings end up looking blurry. My cousin in New Jersey and his wife will have to be at work on Monday and based on the time we’re crossing into Delaware, it will be too late to get to his home, so we contacted him and told him that we’ll be there on Monday night instead. Besides, we’ve never slept in Delaware before. Delaware has always been one of those states that I’ve driven through, because the crossing from New Jersey to Maryland is so quick, until now.

Newark Supercharger

The Newark superchargers are at the Delaware Welcome Center. We drove in with another Model S. As we entered the Delaware Welcome Center and drove toward the superchargers a white Model S was following us. The White Model S driver must’ve been experienced because they didn’t split the circuit with us. We took one supercharger and the other Model S took the other supercharger, we didn’t speak to the other Model S, so aside from it being a white Model S from New Jersey, that was it.

I went inside the Delaware Welcome Center to get a couple of panoramics of the inside of the restaurants for the welcome center for the beta of the (now released) Teslarati App for iOS.

There is a Starbucks in the middle of the welcome center. Additionally, there is a SECOND Starbucks counter to the far left and off the picture (and the far left to the entrance closest to the superchargers.)

The only restaurant that was blocked by this panoramic was a Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen.

In reading plugshare for the welcome center location, it is interesting to note for Roadster drivers that the J1772 charger at this same location is 18kW. That’s a full Roadster speed charge (based on my estimate.) [Of course, based on how the “universe” works, if one were to show up with a Roadster to plug at that location, it would probably be used by a 2011-2012 Leaf or a Chevy Volt that is drawing a 3.3kW at the maximum. But I could just be cynical. ;-)]

Hampton Inn and Suites Christiana Newark

We decided to stay in Delaware as we’ve never slept in this state before. We found a Hampton Inn the next exit North from the Delaware Welcome Center.

Looks like we didn’t make it to New Jersey this Sunday, but, on the plus side, we finally found “reason” to sleep in Delaware. With 214 Miles of Rated Range left, we parked the car for the night and headed in. The superchargers in New Jersey are quite close to each other.

Go on to Day 10. Click here.