“Mo”

I had my last car for 10 reliable, maintenance-free, super comfortable years. I called him “Barney” for the first few years of his life because he was nothing special. Just an old Ford. Then, in St. Louis in 2017, as Rebecca and I were driving the length of the Mississippi River, we changed his name to “Mr. Bixby.” Horace Bixby was the riverboat captain who took the young cub pilot Sam Clemens under his wing and taught him the river. Mark Twain’s stories of Mr. Bixby in “Life on the Mississippi” are mesmerizing. His no-messing-around teaching style, his encyclopedic knowledge of the Mississippi, his civil war exploits, and his union organizing made him one of my heroes. Finding his headstone in the Bellefontaine Cemetery in St. Louis became one of the high points of our trip. Mr. Bixby has been in 42 states and a lot of Canada. He’s never once acted up. Even with 160,000 miles under his belt, he’d do great on another road trip. But it’s time.

Like sailing ships, the steam engine, dial telephones, and black-and-white TVs, time is passing him by. He runs on gasoline, powered by an old-fashioned internal combustion engine. Imagine! In 2024!

Both Mr. Bixby’s

A few weeks ago, I signed a two-year lease on “Mo,” a brand-new all-electric Nissan Ariya. I still have Mr. Bixby. I can’t quite let go of him yet. He’s been a gem of a friend. But “Mo” has some serious “MoJo”! I wanted to name him after an aria. (He is, after all, an Ariya.) But my knowledge of opera is limited at best. As I struggled to think of an aria that would make a fitting name for a new car, I landed on two of my favorite operas (or one opera and one operetta, if you are a purist), “The Magic Flute” by Wolfgang Mozart and “Der Fledermaus,” by Johann Strauss. In the absence of a specific aria, I figured the composers would have to do. “MoJo” it would be; “Mo” for short.

”Mo” drives like a dream: comfy, peppy, and full of autonomous features like automatic lane control, windshield wipers that sense moisture, and high beams that never forget to switch off. When I drive past gas pumps, a snarky inside voice gloatingly whispers, “suckers.”

Now it is time to figure out if the world of 2024 is ready for an EV road trip … on back roads, acceding to our whims of the moment.

Here’s the plan: On December 14, our granddaughter Ella opens a show of four years of her art at the University of Nebraska at Kearney. On December 21, grandson Seff graduates from the University of Nebraska at Lincoln with a degree in horticulture. Plus, we have a brand-new great granddaughter in Omaha whom we have not yet met. The drive to Nebraska would normally take us five or six days. We will allow two weeks. “Mo” supposedly has a range of about 270 miles. I am dubious! We’ll be driving in winter at highway speeds. My goal will be to plan a route with chargers every 100 miles or so. That is easy in the densely populated east; it is harder in the farmlands of the high plains and the stubbornness of the deep south; and it is even harder in the wide-open expanses of the far west.

When we arrive at a charging station, it may be out of order. It may be in use. And who knows what else might go wrong! Regardless, we need to be prepared. In the worst case, we have AAA Plus, which gives us 100 miles of free towing … but a tow truck won’t do the job. We’d need a flatbed. Since there is no neutral gear on an EV (because there is no transmission), turning wheels always engage the motor, and since “Mo” is 4-wheel-drive, when a wheel turns, a motor turns. No more tow trucks for us.

Mostly, I suspect we will need lots of patience and a good sense of humor.

Finding charging stations, I am learning, is not so easy! Tesla has an extensive network of high-speed chargers, but they don’t work on other cars. One day, Tesla will adapt its chargers so they work on cars like “Mo,” but the change is coming slowly. We’re not there yet. Maybe next year. 

Then there’s the issue of charging speeds. Level 2 chargers work fine but take 5-10 hours to charge the batteries. That is fine for an overnight, but not a quick juice-up-and-go. Level 3 chargers will charge to 85% in about a half hour. Not bad if you have the right connector – a CCS in “Mo’s” case.

If I were a motel chain, I would install a charger at every property, advertise the hell out of it, and allow EV drivers to reserve a charger when they reserve their rooms. A few hotels and motels, I have learned, are on that trajectory, but it is still precious few. 

Google Maps is in on this adventure too. If you put a route into Google Maps (on your computer but not on your phone) and then hit the “EV Charging” tab, it will show a lot of the charging stations on the route … but not all of the charging stations by any matter of means.

I have also downloaded apps from different charging companies: “PlugShare,” “Electrify America,” “EVGo,” “ChargePoint,” “ChargeWay,” “ViaLynk,” “ChargeHub,” and “FLO.”

NEWS FLASH … QUESTION: How fast is this landscape changing? ANSWER: As I was writing the last three paragraphs, I got an email from Nissan. In that moment, they notified me that they had added a charging station mapping feature to the “My Nissan” app that combines all of the charging apps from the last paragraph. Nissan has done a bunch of the time-consuming work for me. Regardless, I am still planning on an adventure and allotting a lot more time than I would otherwise just to control frustration.

Stay tuned. You’ll get the skinny as it happens. If we indeed choose to go with EV instead of gas, I expect no shortage of adventures.

EPILOGUE: About 10 minutes ago, Rebecca and I decided to go for it!!! The only uncertainty now is a major winter storm along the route, and I expect that would trip us up regardless of vehicle.