[fivespeedmanual]

Hello fellow BHPians after years of being a viewer of this wonderful forum I finally decided to join it earlier this month. I am delighted on being accepted earlier this week and am excited to share with all about an amazing road trip trip undertaken by me and my family around Diwali 2024 from Mumbai crossing through eight states across India in an Electric Vehicle.
Prelude:
We bought a Tata Nexon.Ev Creative Plus (MR) into our family in December 2023. The car is intended primarily for city (Mumbai) use.



However we were often struck with ideas of its capabilities of driving it outstation and had experimented by taking short trips to Pune & Daman earlier. We realised what limits its potential is a small battery pack i.e. 30 Kw and slow charging speeds of 21Kwh. However this didn’t let us take away the possibility of driving this car across a 4179km road trip. When we got an opportunity to attend a family wedding in Mussoorie at the end of October 2024, we decided to take our Ev on this dream road trip.
We used the Plug Share App to create the routes,locate charging stations,to identify brands & check reviews all along the journey. We owe it to this friendly app for our trip to be a successful one.We reccomend all EV owners to download this app for outstation journeys.




The driving:
Onward
Day1: Mumbai to Ahmedabad (520km)
Day2: Ahmedabad to Jaipur (663km)
Day3: Jaipur to Haridwar (486km)
Day4: Haridwar to Mussoorie (97km)
Return
Day1: Mussoorie to Ludhiana (309km)
Day2: Ludhiana to Jaipur (509km)
Day3: Jaipur to Udaipur (405km)
Day4: Udaipur to Ahmedabad (255km)
Day5: Ahmedabad to Mumbai (520km)
Total days Spent : 13 days
Total Kms : 4179 km
Car Range ( 100%-0%) : Subject to individual driving totally depends upon Wh/km (Approx 220km)
Public Charger Brands Used: Jio BP Pulse, Chargezone (have RFIDS),Adani, Xobolt, Go EV, Statiq, Glida(can be used with statiq app)
Charging Cost : ₹11000 (2.63/km)
Tolls: ₹4000 (0.95/km)
AVG Charging time : 40-50mins

Day 1
To kickstart our road trip we started from Mumbai early morning at 7am to avoid the traffic while exiting the city.


However we faced a TPMS error on the dashboard blinking within the first 7-8kms which made us halt to check all tire pressures. Moving on to the Nh48 we experienced the worst traffic jam of our lifetime which went on for upto 4 hours being added to our already long journey ahead. It was a mess as other people were stuck on the road since 4am and I could write a separate thread for this traffic snarl altogether. At that point we were considering shelfing this roadtrip but I guess we got lucky and soon the traffic was cleared.However we could not make up for this four hour delay in our onward journey.
Roads past Maharashtra are very good as a long stretch of road is under repair in Maharashtra . Our first stop was at Shree Dutt Snacks, Manor for our first meal to ease the headache from the traffic which forced us to recharge ourselves. The roads ahead are smooth and our next meal was at Hyatt Place, Bharuch, a newly opened property in Hyatt Groups Portfolio. The food is excellent and the property has a car charger facility.
We then headed towards Ahmedabad via the NE4 & NE1, these are amazing expressways with 120kmph speed limits however I controlled all my excitement in account for range anxiety striking all of us.
A total of 4 charging sessions landed us in Ahmedabad with only 8% battery to spare.


Checked in at Hyatt Regency Ahmedabad who were kind enough to provide us with a plug to charge overnight.
Day2
With a late head start thanks to the 4 hour delay in the start we rushed ahead to Jaipur via Nh48 ,the roads were amazing however there are many climbs on this route which took a toll on the battery charge.


Anyone travelling on this route is advised to carry food as this route has local dhabas only and it can get frustrating finding a good and hygienic one.
We reached Hyatt Place Jaipur very late at night with 4 charging sessions.

Day3
Before leaving Jaipur the Pink City, we topped up the car battery at Chargezone Marriot,Jaipur


We initially intended to stop at Delhi however Haridwar being closer to our destination Mussoorie we didn’t mind driving the extra bit, across Meerut. We were recommended to take the route via Delhi through Humayun’s Tomb instead of going via Palwal by our relatives who frequented this route.
Jaipur to Delhi is very doable journey with amazing highways & good food options on the way, it makes the drive very pleasurable.
With Netflix accessible from anywhere one can never be bored.


At a particular Go.ev charger I faced a challenge to stop my charging session and ended up pressing the emergency button being the only resort for aid. Anyone ever facing such issues with an app can always do this and then remember to release the button for the next customer to use. We reached Hyatt Place Haridwar another new property, where we checked in late at night. The staff here is very hospitable and accommodated our booking even in the middle of the night.



Day4
As we had shorter distance to cover this day, my hotel fanatic family decided to visit The Pilibhit House in Haridwar an IHCL run property where we dined for lunch besides the Holy Ganga river.




While we filled our bellies, the car was filling its at a Statiq charger close by. We had to arrive for the wedding festivities by evening so we darted ahead towards Mussoorie via Dehradun traffic.


The foothills of Mussoorie were twisty, windy & steep which resulted in high Wh/Km. We even lost our way on these tiny roads where we took some dangerous u-turns. But this car made us reach our destination without any hiccups and that’s how we successfully completed our trip.



The Return Trip

Day1
After 2 days of wedding festivities,celebrations,good food along with Band-Baaja-Baraat and endless memories we left Mussoorie for Ludhiana,Punjab via Chandigarh. Our hotel in Mussorie had a Jio charger which was 7 kw rated which helped us top up before leaving. On our way down we gained 10% of charge thanks to battery regeneration downhill. We stopped at a restaurant called Foresta in Dehradhun for some amazing pizza's before we planned to head to Ludhiana to be with my grandparents and celebrate Diwali with them. We bypassed Ambala citing farmer protests blocking the highway and reached our destination smoothly with just 4 charge stops.

Day2
We ended up spending three nights in Ludhiana as its always nostalgic to be in this city making it difficult for us to say our goodbyes.The car was finally washed here after all these days of intensive running. I also ended up conversing with a Curvv.ev owner who was curious about the MH number plate.The gentleman was not aware about plug share and was disappointed with his battery range of the curvv. I happened to notice that he had a high wh/km and recommended him to not accelerate unnecessarily.




The Curvv is truly a more mature Nexon and looks very futuristic.
Our next stop Jaipur didn’t feel like a long haul from here however we did face some unexpected hurdles.
While planning the trip I took the Trans Haryana Expressway which seemed open and was the shortest, distance wise. However we stumbled upon the farmer protest blocking more than two kilometeres of the highway. The police deployed here helped us in taking a diversion via a broken patch of road and soon we were back again on the highway. There are plenty of stretches that have no chargers on this route so we reccomend to plan wisely.
At a Statiq charger in Narnaul, Haryana we witnessed some mafia like movements which were quite uncomfortable as we reached around sunset. We had people observing our movements, a Bolero with no number plates parked beside us with men getting out of another vehicle while exchanging a duffle filled with God knows what!! It all felt like a thriller movie and we left from here feeling very unsafe.
Jaipur was achieved well in time for dinner and awaiting sleep.
Day3
We ended up spending some great time here in Jaipur. We spent an extra day to explore the city and some hotels. We visited Ram Baugh Palace which was part of the Taj Group Portfolio. Its by far quite luxurious and a lovely heritage property with some amazing Royal Classic Car Collections.


Our next pit stop was at Bapu Bazaar for some shopping and local goodies. For high tea we made our way to Oberoi Raj Vilas which surprisingly had a charger which was not mentioned on the plug share app which I later added to.


Our initial plan was to drive straight to Ahmedabad however Udaipur had us calling as it was on our way, so we reached Oberoi Udaivilas,Udaipur instead for dinner. This property had a public charger facility as well for us to use which I later added to plug share app. The views of Lake Pichola,Udaipur are breathtaking by night.




Day4
We spent the night in Udaipur and explored some parts of the city the next day.On local reccomendation we visited Sai Baba Pratha Centre to eat some hyped parathas which were indeed delicious and also visited the famous Jagdish Temple for Darshan.




Post exploring a few eateries and temples we began to move for Ahmedabad. Route was very familiar via the NH48. The downhill helped me achieve great efficiency. We arrived in Ahmedabad at the same Hyatt Regency who always helped us to charge our vehicle and also upgraded us to a club room this time. For dinner we went to a heritage hotel called House of MG for their amazing Traditional Gujrati food.




Day5
The last leg of our journey was not very motivating. Nobody likes ending a holiday but as they say all good things come to an end. We left late from Ahmedabad via the same routes we crossed earlier. On our way we also experienced a queue for charging our vehicle which made us locate other choices around and we were luckt to find one down the road. This makes me dwell that with an increase in EV vehicles we would need multiple chargers in the future.



The roads in Gujarat are pretty smooth with no gap for error. We stopped over at our favourite Hyatt Place, Bharuch again for some amazing food and the only EV charger on our route at this point. While moving ahead I came across a charger (GLIDA) which didn’t work for us and had a grid issue. We wasted almost fifteen minutes here trying to make one charger work out of the six available. We then went ahead to another option at Hotel Ginger,Vapi to charge in their basement charger where no mobile network was available. One really faces challenges thrown at them all together. But some how we managed to begin charging with one person running outside for network while the other prepares for charging. Our last charger was near Manor a 150kw Hyundai charger. It was the first time I ever saw such a big rated charger which was in collaboration with Chargezone.
While entering Maharashtra I’ve witnessed the worst roads of our trip. They were short of being called moon craters. Adding to these bad roads was the poor visibility at night. Anyone moving via NH48 should be careful on the Maharashtra side as loads of work is pending and the roads are going to damage some rims and tires. Luckily the only damage we faced was a mismatched wheel alignment.
We finally concluded our trip covering more than 4000kms and amazing memories very late at night.
I must conclude that India is truly EV ready. The drive being smooth makes the journey pleasurable also to mention that one is thrilled with the experiences the countries today has to offer. Crossing different cities and states one gets a feel of the diverse cultures of our country and carries a memory along the way.This trip has made me applaud Tata Motors for being an early entrant into the Ev market having created this great product. While many may have faced challenges with this car our journey proved otherwise.

[motobuntu]

Thanks for this travelogue, this will encourage other EV owners like me to embark on long trips across the country. There is an app named 'EVarc' (not as good as Plugshare in terms of locating chargers) which I discovered recently on Google play store, this has good route planning features.

Wishing you many happy electric miles!

[sheelRP]

Thanks for sharing information. As a fellow EV Kona owner, always felt a bit anxious on our highways considering present charging infrastructure. Yes, things are getting better but still it needs a bit of planning your route for charging stations . I found jio bp pulse app very helpful apart from plug share. Since, I am in Ahmedabad, my go to apps are PlugShare, jio bp pulse and charge zone. They work well in GJ. During my recent rip to amd-ujjain-omkareshwar-amd, found jio bp pulse working well.

[TORQUEINDUCTION]

Awesome travelogue. One quick query though. We have heard about many TATA owners facing the HV error when charging back to back on higher capacity chargers. Is that issue only for older models of Tiago and Nexon? Did you avoid any specific chargers when selecting charging stops. This travelogue will give confidence to lot of EV owners to embark on long road trips. Thanks

[shivangbhatt]

Originally Posted by fivespeedmanual

Total days Spent : 13 days
Total Kms : 4179 km
Car Range ( 100%-0%) : Subject to individual driving totally depends upon Wh/km (Approx 220km)
Public Charger Brands Used: Jio BP Pulse, Chargezone (have RFIDS),Adani, Xobolt, Go EV, Statiq, Glida(can be used with statiq app)
Charging Cost : ₹11000 (2.63/km)
Tolls: ₹4000 (0.95/km)
AVG Charging time : 40-50mins

Inspiring journey. Thanks for sharing. If it is possible with 30kwh car (Nexon), it should be possible with 35kwh (Punch) car as well. Could you please share the challenges faced in charging.

[fivespeedmanual]

Originally Posted by TORQUEINDUCTION

Awesome travelogue. One quick query though. We have heard about many TATA owners facing the HV error when charging back to back on higher capacity chargers. Is that issue only for older models of Tiago and Nexon? Did you avoid any specific chargers when selecting charging stops. This travelogue will give confidence to lot of EV owners to embark on long road trips. Thanks

On this particular trip I did not face any HV Error however I’ve noticed that even whenever it comes, the car functions completely fine. I reset the car by switching it off and locking it before restarting it after 10 mins and I have all the errors dissappear. This issue is more persistent to the earlier ziptron models where the car stalls and can be rectified by removing the negative terminal of the battery and refitting it essentially resetting the system.

To your second question, I would say I avoided chargers with bad reviews and low score on plug share more specifically BPCL chargers and HP chargers. It’s essential to verify the particular brand app also simultaneously to verify the active status. Cheers!

[fivespeedmanual]

Originally Posted by shivangbhatt

Inspiring journey. Thanks for sharing. If it is possible with 30kwh car (Nexon), it should be possible with 35kwh (Punch) car as well. Could you please share the challenges faced in charging.

Yes, indeed its possible however there has to be great planning involved.
I usually clubbed my meal pitstops with charging which saved me time. A 500-600kms jorney in an ICE vehicle usually takes 12 hrs non-stop. On avg on such a journey one would stop atleast for 1.5 hrs in total for a meal break and leg stretching. With an EV with low range(200-250kms) I account for an additional 3 hours for charging which i merged with my meal breaks which essentially means i utilised only 1.5 hrs more than an ICE vehicle.So considering you have 35Kwh battery you could complete a trip with speeds at 70-80kmph in good time.
On this journey I did not face any charging issue other than the ones mentioned on the thread.However always keep 40-50 kms buffer for any faulty chargers along with your next backup. Usually all chargers have great helplines for assistance and one can always call them. Cheers!