We’re taking Jeff to Southern California so we can use up some of our timeshare points; it’s our first road trip in the EV-6, and it’s been…umm, interesting.

I charged the car overnight at home to the usual 80%, at which point it claims to be able to drive about 230 miles before running out of charge. We planned to have lunch and recharge at Harris Ranch, about 140 miles away, so I thought it’d be an easy drive. Hah!

We stopped, as usual, at Casa de Fruita to stretch our legs and wander around a bit. I set Harris Ranch into the car’s nav system and was surprised when it told me that I might want to charge the battery to be sure of reaching our destination – we only had 90 miles to go and the dash showed 160 miles of range, so I hit “ignore” and drove off.

The car warned me twice more in the next ten minutes; I told it to leave me alone and kept driving. Just before we got to I-5, I realized that the navigation system was trying to take me to the charging station at the Motel 6 nearby; I ignored it and got onto I-5. After all, I had 65 miles of cushion.

When we were passing Panoche, about 35 miles from Harris Ranch, the car was down to 30% of charge and only showing about 80 miles available. I would have stopped for a charge if I’d seen any stations on the map, but it showed nothing – later, I discovered that the Shell station at that exit has Electrify America fast chargers, which I’ll keep in mind for future trips.

We made it to Harris Ranch with about 19% left on the charge meter and 35 miles on the range meter. I quickly found a charger and plugged in and set the car to charge to 90% while we ate. It finished charging before we finished eating.

The rest of the day’s drive was uneventful and we reached the Bakersfield Marriott with the battery at 50%. We checked in, unpacked, and headed off to recharge the car and have dinner. Charging was easy; finding a place for dinner was more difficult. The first few places we looked at didn’t work (one, Firestone Grill, was incredibly loud inside, which I guess is part of their schtick). We ended up at Bok Bok Chicken for Korean Fried Chicken. It was OK, but not worth a repeat visit.

Jeff made a special request for a visit to Kevin McCarthy’s congressional office; it wasn’t easy to find, but we succeeded, and Jeff made sure to show proper respect for the former Speaker.

I will be more attentive to the car’s warnings in the future.

I’d applied for Clean Air Decals for the EV-6 in late August, as soon as I had my ham radio license plates officially transferred to the car. I didn’t expect to get the decals quickly, but I did hope they’d be in my hands soon after we got home from Europe. I was surprised when the envelope the DMV sent me a few days ago didn’t have the decals; instead, it contained my application and check and a note saying they couldn’t process my application because “Car Title Surrendered 9/1 – AZ”.

I used the DMV’s online chat to talk with an agent who told me I could bring the title to DMV or AAA to “update its status”. Needless to say, I chose AAA – who couldn’t figure out what to do, so they sent me to the DMV.

I picked a good day to go to the DMV; there were hardly any lines. I was at a window in under ten minutes, and explained the situation to the agent. She looked some things up on her computer and brought me to another agent, Meeta, who she said could actually fix the problem. I explained the situation to Meeta, who spent more time in communion with her computer and said that it appeared that when my old car was sold by Carvana, somehow the title for the new car got into the process (I guess because both cars had the same license plate number, my ham call) and was cancelled. But she could fix it.

More typing, and then she told me to go out to my car and drive it over to the “Verification Lane” so they could officially verify that the car had the proper VIN for the title that I was holding in my hand. That took a few minutes; at one point, the verifier apologized because, even though the car was electric, he had to look under the hood to check that there were no smog problems.

There were no smog problems and all of the VIN labels were correct, so he handed me a “Verification of Vehicle” form and cautioned me not to sign it or it would become void. I took the form back to Meeta and watched her type for a few minutes. She said all that remained was for her to call DMV Central in Sacramento and have them uncancel the title.

Meeta called Sacramento and spoke with someone who put her on hold. I could hear the hold music from her phone as she waited for an answer. Ten minutes later, the call dropped. She called back and kept holding (she processed quite a few driver’s licenses while she was on hold – I was impressed!), and eventually got through to someone. A bit more conversation, and then she hung up the phone and told me that Sacramento was going to call her when everything was set. She told me that I didn’t need to wait around any longer and promised to call me by the end of the day with the results. I was a little hesitant to leave, but I’d already spent two hours at the DMV; I went home to wait.

Half an hour later, Meeta called to tell me that all was well and that I could resubmit the application for the decals.

I guess I’ll find out if everything is really in order in another couple of months.