By the time we hit Kelso, it was clear my family’s post-Christmas EV adventure was hitting the skids.
After departing from Seattle, we stopped in Olympia for lunch and a little recharge for our recently purchased 2024 Mach-E — the electric Ford Mustang. But the Level 2 charger found via Google Maps offered a paltry boost and we had 115 miles to our Portland destination.
No problem. We’d make a second stop at a Tesla Supercharger in Kelso, a small city off of Interstate 5 formerly known for logging and smelt fishing. The Mach-E sucked up electrons from the DC fast charger, hitting 80% charge in about 20 minutes.
But when we went to unplug, the third-party adapter that allowed us to charge our non-Tesla EV wouldn’t budge. We were trapped, tethered to the station via a high-powered cable, late on a Saturday afternoon. All-knowing YouTube offered a fix: use a really big pair of pliers called channel locks to force the button to give. My husband went off on foot to a nearby farm supply store seeking the device.
Our 17-year-old daughter, in the meantime, had run out of TikToks and patience. She began wrestling the adapter herself and through a combination of finesse, strength and desperation she disengaged the charger. It was a giddy moment — but a brief reprieve as we continued driving south.
Wintry temperatures and dinner in the brilliantly named Portland suburb of Scappoose left the Mustang battery unnervingly low. More map searching near our hotel led us to a nearly empty parking garage that promised charging on the eighth floor. After circling to the roof we found one broken charger and another being used by a couple in an embrace outside their electric truck, inexplicably kissing in the cold.
The charging mishaps had left us tired, frustrated and anxious — with only ourselves to blame.
Falling in love with an EV
Historically, I’ve been largely indifferent toward cars, owning a series of forgettable Toyotas and Hondas — safe, reliable cars that got me from point A to B with reasonable fuel efficiency. I had wanted to go electric in 2017 when shopping for my previous car, but the Chevy Bolt was underwhelming and Tesla too swanky. A Toyota Prius it was.
Then on a sunny afternoon last October, a driver mounted a steep hill in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood, failed to brake at a stop sign, and smashed into my Prius. I was rattled but largely unscathed, and so was the other driver and his passenger. Both cars, however, were totaled.
Their insurance covered the loss and we searched for a replacement. My husband genuinely likes cars and took the lead in shopping with my one condition in mind: it had to be an EV.
We landed on the Mach-E, which startled friends and family alike who knew my milquetoast automotive track record. But despite its relative machismo and flash, the Mustang was the practical choice — good real-world range at about 240 miles, great value, and the roomy interior of a crossover-style vehicle.
One spin behind the wheel and I was smitten. I love the car. It handles nicely. It’s comfortable. The fact it can go from zero to 60 in 4 seconds doesn’t really impact my reality, but pleases me all the same. I size up exhaust-spewing muscle cars next to me at stoplights and imagine smoking them.
When the holidays arrived, I was cruising in my Mach-E and imagined that our Portland trip would be as easy as traveling via gas power.
After all, the EV market share had hit more than 20% in Washington in 2024, and charging stations were cropping up at grocery stores and along highways. I didn’t want to spend the time figuring out which of the many available apps was best for finding charging sites. I didn’t want to download and create accounts with the many charging service providers. I just wanted to tap the accelerator.
But that wasn’t realistic. Energy infrastructure takes time to deploy. For decades after the internal combustion engine reigned supreme, drivers still needed to map out gas stops on lengthy road trips. Things improved for EVs in general when Tesla began opening its Supercharger network to non-Tesla drivers in 2023. (A GeekWire story the year before recounted the headaches faced by an electric Mustang road tripper without that access.)
The EV charging network, however, is still lagging and faces new challenges under the Trump administration, which has imposed policies to remove incentives and slow EV infrastructure deployment.
Pro tips for EV newbies
In most ways, I’d found the switch to an EV surprisingly convenient. We’re fortunate to have off-street parking at home, and it’s super satisfying to simply click a Level 1 slow charger into car and walk away. The device uses a regular outlet in our garage and generally provides the vehicle enough power for work, errands and local day trips.
We drove the Mustang on an overnight trip to Bellingham, Wash., in November and easily found power at clearly marked, city-owned parking spots with free electrons. On a separate outing to hike near the tulip capital of Mount Vernon, I simply plugged in afterwards at an EVgo fast charger near my house to quickly refill.
We were lulled into complacency and unprepared for longer EV travel. After botching Portland, I checked in with Seattle-area experts for charging tips, which left me feeling sheepish for my self-inflicted ignorance.
I got feedback from Matthew Metz, founder of Coltura and CEO of EVQ, a startup supporting EV purchases; Scott Case, founder of the EV data platform Recurrent; and Grace Reamer and Jay Donnaway, who are respectively current and past leaders of the Seattle Electric Vehicle Association, or SEVA.
My takeaways:
- PlugShare is the one-stop source for maps that include information on how many chargers are available at seemingly every possible site at any given moment and include helpful user feedback. We should have turned here first.
- When on a road trip, plan on DC fast charging. Case recommends Tesla as the most numerous and consistently reliable option. Without knowledge of our Kelso fiasco, Donnaway suggested that non-Tesla drivers get an adapter for fast charger plugs and “gain some experience with using it before it’s needed in a tight spot.”
- Always carry a Level 1 charger for opportunities to use outlets at hotels and retail sites in a pinch.
- Reamer offered battery-saving suggestions, such as following speed limits, slowly accelerating, coasting downhill, drafting behind semi-trucks and using seat heaters in lieu of cabin heat.
EVQ and Recurrent also have their own terrific sources for essential information:
- EVQ/Coltura released EV Chat, a generative AI tool built from a curated library of EV-related information. The chatbot is available for free and found on the Electric For All site and “should be able to answer your questions really well,” Metz said. A quick test proved him right.
- Recurrent has a “great starter resource on charging that everyone should look at when they are just starting out,” Case advised. It covers home and public charging options, charging speeds, costs, diagrams of the different plugs and sockets, and even pointers on public charging etiquette.
Despite our rookie mistakes, panic and wasted time, we did have a nice trip to Portland (I highly recommend Casa Zoraya for amazing Peruvian food and my body literally aches for a return to Dragontree Spa).
Looking ahead, we’ll undertake our next road trip with a full charge, a better plan and a car I still love.
https://ift.tt/Pu2ZKMz January 07, 2026 at 03:20PM GeekWire
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