Return Day 4 - ON to ON

For some reason we were upgraded at the Delta in Thunder Bay to a room overlooking the lake – check out the view at sunrise!! That’s Sleeping Giant (or Nanabijou), in the distance – a mesa, with some of the steepest cliffs in Ontario, and just missed the 7 Wonders of Canada list ;). Grabbed brekkie on the road and headed out – the hotel charger overnight just got us to 88%.

First stop Nipigon Petro Canada – thought to check ahead that it actually was working as reports from the past several months were that it wasn’t – today’s Petro Canada customer service agent told us they can’t advise as to the status of any of their units??!? Funny, as it was her colleague yesterday that assured us the Kenora charger existed and was working!. So frustrating…starting to get a bit foggy…not a good sign.

Rolled into Nipigon just in case…and it’s actually working! Pulled in literally 1 minute before another couple (going the opposite direction) who luckily had enough to get to Thunder Bay as only the one unit was working. We hadn’t preconditioned (expecting it not to be working) so we’re only getting 57or so kW, and it dropped quickly to 42kW so we’re moving on – we know we can get at least 50 in Terrace Bay at Drifter’s Motel.

Got to Terrace Bay, and oops, it’s an Ivy so only getting 37kW - stayed 27 mins to get what we needed.

For some reason, the car didn’t know there was a charger in Marathon where we headed next. The Ioniq automatically turns on battery conditioning, but if it doesn’t know of a charger you’re going to, you can’t manually turn it on to condition it – so we couldn’t condition again.

Nevertheless, back we were in Marathon (of the birthday adventure in December)! And lo and behold, the fast charger was working this time – the sweet sound of charging – and fast to boot -116 kw! Marathon has redeemed itself…grabbed sushi and a salad at local grocery store and we’re happy campers.

On to Wawa Petro Canada, where we got 190kw!! That may be our best ever!! Token photo of the Wawa Goose. And it’s turned into a lovely day – sunshine and about 12 degrees again.

Last leg is the longest stretch of the whole trip without chargers available – from the Wawa PetroCan to Sault Ste. Marie – closest next charger is 220km – we went on a little further to our hotel charger at the Days Inn – still lots of range. Unbelievably, we’ve arrived the Soo at 5:15pm – unheard of! And both chargers available (and working) in the parking lot, so we’re set for the night and can now go take Alfie for a little walk and find something to eat.

Luckily before we headed out, Geoff checked his phone, only to find that the hotel charger was priced at $8.00/HOUR!!! This is a slow charger so would have taken us 8 hours or roughly $64 to fuel up for the night (OMG!). Quick jab of the Stop Charging button and off Geoff went to the closest Petro Canada ten minutes away - a quick 27 minutes there are we're up to 88% - and paid a whopping $13.68!! (or $30/hour but done in a fraction of the time). Lesson learned - don't just assume the charge will be something reasonable! Now off for something to eat...FYI, in addition to crazy expensive charging, this hotel is home to the SooBlaster - so not only was there a bar which must have had half of SSM under 40 in it but also an Indian wedding going on a few doors down from us - not likely to repeat this one ;)