Home Bound - Day 47

After 46 days of being away from home, if sure feels good to be heading home today. Today we drove another 460 miles from San Diego. The traffic and weather were pretty bad. I had forgotten how horrible the traffic is in LA - yuck. 

Then, when we got north of the Grapevine the rain started. There were so many people on the road trying to get to where they were going for New Years celebrations, that it was hard to even do the speed limit on I-5. We got home at 5:00 as the "atmospheric river" was still flowing onto the central coast.

7,680 miles in 47 days is 164 miles per day (average). The longest day was 594 miles (from Ozona TX to Willcox AZ) and really boring - pretty much just dirt & rocks.

The whole trip so far:

Total: 7,680.5 Miles, 2794.8 kWh consumed = 364 Wh/mile

Today: 460.4 Miles, 7:35 driving, 149.4 kWh consumed = 325 Wh/mile. 

Here is the detailed data:

It's really good to be home!

West Bound - Day 46

Today we drove another 550 miles to San Diego to visit Steve at Aptera  to visit their new factory. The weather has been good so far, nothing except some light rain and fog. No snow, or heavy rain to deal with. I get the feeling that our drive tomorrow will have rain in it, as the atmospheric river is still flowing onto the central coast.

The whole trip so far:

Total: 7,220.2 Miles, 2645.4 kWh consumed = 366 Wh/mile

Today: 554.1 Miles, 7:49 driving, 200.0 kWh consumed = 361 Wh/mile. 

Here is the detailed data:

West Bound - Day 44

Today we drove from Sugar Land to Ozona Texas, visiting our high school friend Scott in Kerrville on the way for lunch at a wine tasting shop that had excellent food - Grape Juice. Our efficiency is going down again, because with a speed limit of 80 MPH, we are gobbling down the KiloWattHours.

The whole trip so far:

Total: 6,071.0 Miles, 2993.8 kWh consumed = 361 Wh/mile

Today: 405.2 Miles, 5:53 driving, 166.4 kWh consumed = 411 Wh/mile

Here is the detailed data for the day:

Sugar Land area - Days 35-43

Each day I took Suzanne over to visit her mom as I used her Wi-Fi to work online. There were a few things that she wanted me to see about fixing, and there are only a few left for after we got back from visiting my parents. The one I'm most proud of is getting her deep freezer working again...

We tried to not get in the way of Greg & Marika's routine. We want to be those guests that they want to invite back. I hope we didn't get in their way too much.

We took Suzanne's mother down to visit her uncle George in Taylor Lake Village (near NASA's JSC). During the early Space Shuttle days I made that trip a LOT. We provided the "pool feed" for the networks with our transportable (C-Band) uplink for several years, until we installed a point-to-point microwave link back to our teleport.

The rest of the time the drives were pretty short, just around Sugarland. I did go to my favorite BBQ joint in Bellaire, Blood Brother's BBQ.

The drive during days 35-43 around Sugar Land and the surrounding area:

Around the Sugar Land Area: 246.5 Miles, 95.4 kWh consumed = 387 Wh/mile.

Drive Southeast - Day 34

On our drive back to Sugar Land today, we stopped in to see an old friend Cheryl and her partner Skip. They live in South Austin (almost on the way) and we met up at a cool little BBQ place on Menchaca Rd called Valentina's Tex-Mex BBQ. The Brisket and the Carnitas were excellent! I can see why they place was featured in Diners Drive-ins & Dives.

I hadn't seen Cheryl since 2000, when we worked together at IDB Systems (a WorldCom company). She hasn't changed one bit! Still so full of energy and life! We ate, and we sat and talked for 2 hours until everyone was too cold and we had to go on our separate ways. But we vowed that we would get together again the next time we were in the same area, whether that's Austin or California. 

On the way we had to stop at the Buc-ee's again so Suzanne could get her Buc-ee's fix. I added to our charge while we wandered around inside with what seemed to be half of Texas. I appreciate that they added the Superchargers since last year. Before we would have had to make two stops...

Then we had to stop at Hruska's Koache shop in Ellinger (half way between Austin & Houston on highway 71).

We got to Sugar Land with 20% charge, but since we installed the 20A 240V outlet, I'll be full (90%) before dawn.

The whole trip so far:

Total: 5,419.4 Miles, 94:25 driving, 1,932.1 kWh consumed = 357 Wh/mile

Today: 222.4 Miles, 3:46 driving, 84.6 kWh consumed = 380 Wh/mile.

 

Here is the detailed data: