Port Hueneme and Charging for the Trip

OK, OK I overslept after watching LA Confidential on HBO at the Goodnite Inn. I got to Hueneme at 9 am and was directed to a charger by Chris "Spaceship" Yoder. Bill Mason showed up very shortly afterwards with his friend Maggie (Does NEVATBL ring a bell?). I ended up at one of the two major charging area at the Port (I think they had at least 20 EV charging stations in toto at the base. See Mark Looper's website for a view of another station.) Again, wow, I had never seen such a number of electric vehicles in one place. And the diversity: EV1's, RAV 4's, an Altra (Pathfinder body with Lithium ion batteries) brought in by R. Reinhard and family. Tremendous. We spent the next 2 hours chatting and getting to know each other. Yeah, EV people are OK, if a bit fanatical. (Thanks Maggie for the coffee: I needed it.) Thanks to everyone at the Port. The VIP EV placards were really neat. Of course, Ed Begley, Jr. showed up with an electric Chevy truck ( His EV1 was in the shop, so untimely.). And lest I forget, Bob and Chelsea Sexton, Rick Ostrov and the new brand manager, Ken Stewart showed up too. Hey, maybe I'm wrong, but even at this point Ken seemed young and vigorous enough to help the EV1 move along. We're now almost ready to hit the road.

Port Hueneme, Malibu, City Hall in Santa Monica and Santa Monica Pier

The group (33 Ev's, I believe) gathered together in the foggy weather (It never lifted.) to listen to the final instructions from our leader, G. Hanssen. We were a bit late (11:30 am) but we should end up at SM's City just in time to meet the press at 1 pm. And we were off!

This was a bad moment for me: I couldn't decide the music to play at such a moment. Magic Carpet Ride by Steppenwolf or The Ninth by Beethoven (BTW, whenever I take someone new in the EV1, I always play Magic Carpet Ride!). I finally decided on The Ninth as all the EV's headed out the gate of Hueneme. Good choice: It would last me all the way to Santa Monica.

Beautiful, absolutely beautiful! The coast was socked in, but when stopped to take that wonderful picture (Mark Looper, again) at the turning from Ventura to L.A. counties, I was lost for words. After that moment the fun really began.

Photo by Fred Beers

Up to this point, there were no lights or traffic and the road was one lane either way. Now, we had stoplights, two lanes, either way, and traffic. The cohesiveness of our rally frayed a bit. However, we came together, fell apart, came together again. It was a game. Who could lead, who could hold us together. Two highlights: Bob and Chelsea filming everybody as we drove, and the T-Zero kicking ass whenever she wanted too.

Finally, we made it to City Hall (Dave Kodama has some nice photo's). And guess what: there were absolutely no press people. That's all right. It was a great trip anyway.

Now it was time for Bob Seldon to divvy out charging spaces. I lucked out because of him: I was to charge on the Pier itself! No bus yard (see Santa Monica bus yard photos), no promenade, but the Pier itself! Wonderful. Ed Huestis and I were to share a charger. But we didn't need to: he opened the trunk of his EV1 and pulled out all sorts of paraphenalia that would enable him to charge with any contraption (He hooked up to a conductive: I think we have Tom Dowling to blame for such resourcefulness.).

Lunch followed at Rusty's on the Pier. They did a great job, considering we actually had as may as 70 or more people show up. Ken stewart made a cute speech, I got to meet Jaci from Orange, I had a great G&T and a beer (Sierra Nevada, draft.).

It was a great couple of days for me, but now at 3:30 pm I was just too pooped to continue on the second leg and headed home to Westchester (CA, that is.).

Thanks a bunch to Bob, Greg, Bill and everyone else involved. I was truly pleased to meet you. Hey Jaci, I'm so glad you were able to make it all the way, even if you ran on reduced for 9 miles (?).