2016 ElMoto 4Corners - McCook, NE to Denver
After another terrific AirBnB experience, I headed for Denver. Little did I know that I could travel so fast that an unexpected meetup would be possible with the Hollywood Electrics guys who are preparing to race at Pikes Peak.
My first few charging spots were town parks that have RV Hookups. Much like the easy-peasy charging in Ohio at service plazas, it was simple-simon to charge at parks in towns. There is no attendant to discuss anything with, and I dropped a couple of bucks in the drop box.
Once in Colorado I had some bad luck. My Supercharger stopped charging at 86% which was juuuuuuust enough to get to the next planned stop. However, I decided to stop at a town in between and see if there was an RV Park. There was, and they kindly let me charge even though I arrived unannounced.
Once i was in Limon, CO I had a choice to make. Travel to Colorado Springs to see the Hollywood Electrics crew racing at Pike’s Peak, or head straight to my friend’s house in Denver. My friend wouldn’t be available until later, so I decided on Colorado Springs. This turned out to be a great choice!
I got to see some friends from Hollywood Electrics, met the racers, met a couple of EV guys from the ElectricMotorcycleForum.com website and had a blast with one of the reps from Zero Motorcycles. Didn’t quite get to meet Brian Wisman from Victory (formerly Brammo), but I tried.
Also, I managed to miss most of the rain by taking this route. Denver was getting soaked while I was enjoying sunshine and camaraderie at Pikes Peak Fan Fest. I didn’t miss all of it though. About 40 miles west of Colorado Springs I hit some intense rain that felt like pebbles hitting my legs and hands at 60mph. There was a lot of lightning as well, but none too close. Oh the irony if my electric motorcycle painted with lightning bolts got struck by lightning…
After hanging out with the electric motorcycle crew at Fan Fest for Pikes Peak Int’l Hill Climb, I headed up to see my buddy in Denver. The wind at my back was great on the ride to Denver, but i didn’t quite get enough charge in Colorado Springs. At first there were a couple of Eaton chargers that wouldn’t work with my supercharger. Then the Hollywood Electrics guys gave me some juice from there truck full of batteries.
On my way to Denver I stopped at a McDonald’s with a NEMA 14-50 outlet. It seemed to work fine, so I went in to get a smoothie. When I went back out to check on my system it turns out that the breaker flipped off about 1 minute after I went inside. So the bike wasn’t charged and I was getting later and later for meeting my friend.
I pushed onward to a Walgreens that had a SemaCharge station, and that also didn’t work with my Supercharger (beta version) so I waited 20 minutes while slowly charging.
Finally I met my buddy at a bar where the bartender made a version of a Manhattan as best she could without all the right ingredients. Since there was some Glenlivet Scotch in there, it was quite good.
Hanging out with my friend from childhood was awesome and we talked until 2am. Next up is kayaking and swing dancing tomorrow!
