Day 2 was another travel day. We had to go from Mesquite, Nevada to Visalia, California, near Sequoia and King’s Canyon national parks. We stopped in Las Vegas to pick up our daughter who had flown in to meet us.

Ugh, the drive from Las Vegas to Baker, California was slow due to traffic. One reason was that mud and debris had washed over the road from convective storms in some places so traffic was backed up while the highway was being cleared. The major reason, we learned from the server at dinner, was that traffic is horrible on Sunday afternoon in that stretch. The traffic was something that I had not allowed for.

It was cool to see so many Joshua trees (this was a novel experience for me). This part of California is very different from our usual haunts. The Tesla navigation system worked flawlessly, even routing us around an accident (there were three in the stretch) down county two-lane blacktop at one point. There was standing water on that road in a couple of places. The NWS warning, “Turn around don’t drown, unless you see someone else get through safely,” was on my mind. 🙂

Our hotel is a Tesla destination hotel so after picking up a bit of charge in Bakersfield we plugged in overnight at our base for exploring the sequoias. We utilized Tesla superchargers in, Mesquite, NV, Las Vegas, NV and Bakersfield, CA but could have gotten away with fewer stops according to the Tesla trip planner. I am very impressed with the ease of navigation and the quick charging at the superchargers.

It is so cool that I can rent a Tesla for long driving vacations and not use my Nissan Leaf with it’s more limited range.