Clean Electrons Before the Frost

Preparing my Hyundai Kona EV for an eighteen-week hibernation formed the primary mechanical errand on this morning's departure checklist. Electric vehicles require no fuel stabilizer, oil changes, or exhaust checks, trading greasy maintenance for simple battery math and tire management. I drove up to Queen's Park to complete the seasonal preparations amidst the autumn foliage. High on the mountains near Golden Ears Park, a fresh dusting of snow stood out brilliantly against the clear, crisp morning air.

 

Managing the main driving battery for a long rest is remarkably simple. I plugged into the Flo station at the park to take in clean electrons and set the target charge to 82%. That number holds effortlessly in our subterranean parkade at Carnarvon Place. That parking stall remains a steady 10°C throughout the darkest months, sparing the cells from freezing sluggishness. The car maintains the twelve-volt auxiliary battery automatically. The main pack will read the exact same 82% when the elevator doors open in March. 

Tire pressure required a dedicated detour to the local Chevron. Low-rolling-resistance tires feature stiff compounds that develop flat spots when heavy battery mass presses down on stationary rubber for months. I intentionally pumped them up past their normal baseline to build extra structural stiffness. That added pressure keeps the casing true against the cold parkade floor.

 

With electrons stored and tires braced, the vehicle is safely decommissioned for the season. Well, after we cloak it under a car cover, that is. Tomorrow should be rather low-key with any remaining packing and apartment preparations before we leave early Sunday morning. The mechanical loose ends are tied up, leaving only our passports and packed luggage for the meandering path to South America.

A Bit Up the Hill

 

My EV had a charge of 77%, which is far more than I needed for tomorrow's little trip.  At around noon, we are going to ride out to Golden Ears Park, specifically to the Alouette Lake campground.  Tim rode his motorcycle out to camp for the week at the popular provincial park. Tomorrow, Jiwan will come out to New West after a morning, doctor's visit and will come along with Jay and me.  The whole trip will be around 120 km.  We plan on bringing some picnic things for a lunchtime visit.

Although my Kona could have travelled about 400 km on what was in my battery,  I wanted to see if the Level 2 chargers were still working up at City Hall in New Westminster. I hadn't checked since last summer. I figured I could go see and top up Kimchi with a bit more juice on the slow 240v, Flo-branded charging provided by the city.  This is how they charge up a couple of city vehicles and they can be accessed by the public too for a couple of bucks an hour.

I found both spaces were empty so I plugged in.  Then, I walked home through Tipperary Park and down the hill.  It has already been one hour.  I'll go sit in the hot tub for a little while because Jay is at the Bonsor Rec Center for senior gym hours.  I can walk back up the hill.  It'll take about 10 minutes to do so.  I can drive the car back after its second hour.

More DC Fast Chargers at Our Supermarket

My car literally runs on water. 

Around 90% of British Columbia's power supply is hydroelectric. We are primarily self sufficient because of our many large-scale dams.  In fact, our provincial electrical utility is named BC Hydro.  

Today, my car sipped some of it while we were doing our grocery shopping.  It is a perfect arrangement because my building still has not installed charging facilities.  It is sheer logic to kill two birds with one stone.

The rates for charging in the province just had an increase.  However, this is due to the implementation of a large, province-wide system of DC charging stations.  British Columbia is larger than the US states of California, Oregon, and Washington State combined.   

I do pay a bit more than if I were able to charge in my own garage, but most people have no idea of just how cheap it is to drive an EV.   I tried to calculate once and figured out that it was magnitudes cheaper than buying gasoline.  I know the calculation make even more sense today, much more sense.  On top of that, there are about 20 or 30 moving parts in EV propulsion system compared to thousands in an internal combustion engine.  I don't have oil changes and little maintenace whatsoever.  

Today, I spent a total of nearly US$ 7.75.  I'll probably have to do the exact same thing again after a few weeks.

[I chose the mere 50 kW charger because I didn't want to run outside before we finished grocery shopping.  There is a bank of 180 kW ones here too. Once the car hits 80% charge it negotiates slower speeds for the remainder to ensure battery safety and life.] 

Less Than a Year's Use After Seven!

When we came out of the Superstore with the cart of grocery bags today, I liked how the sun was hiding behind the clouds. I snapped a picture of my EV as its colour called, Lake Silver, matched the scene.

 

I love driving the Hyundai Kona Electric.  As we're gone for at least five months a year, the experience seems fresh when we return from winters away. Electric motors have instant torque. Yes, I can spin the tires at the stoplight if I press the 'sports mode' button.

We got it during the first spring of COVID and for that summer and the next, travel was discouraged.  As well, we never go to the US anymore, so I'm pretty sure it only went into Washington state once. 

The adaptive cruise control makes highway driving a joy.  It's not like we do much of it, though.  The majority of the kilometers were added going uptown and to the Coquitlam Superstore.  Last summer, for my birthday week, we took a road trip to Jasper, Alberta and down the beautiful Icefields Parkway to Lake Louise!  That was the farthest it has ever been from home.  

I was surprised when I realized the car is nowhere near being new.  One cannot argue with simple arithmetic:  2026 - 2019 = 7.    Although Kimchi is now seven years old, she has just a bit over 15,000 km on the odometer.  That is around 9320 miles.  So it is still a pretty new old vehicle.

The First Chore When Getting Back

Since the beginning of November I've been starting my e-journal posts with the phrase, "Day XXX of Our Winter". We're home and now that is no longer true. However, I have to say that it sure seems like the local winter weather from which we escaped so successfully.

Since we've been returning from retirement winters a dozen years already, we are quite familiar with what we have to do when getting home.  There is an internalized check list and we've started checking off the items one by one.  One of the very first things I always need to do is buy insurance for the car.  I purchase only eight months of coverage as that is how long until we leave for an overseas hotspot again.  Unfortunately, I could not drive to accomplish that chore as I didn't have insurance on the vehicle.  Doh!  

The weather was wet.  I guess we're having a late atmospheric river, as these rainy systems are called here.  I took the SkyTrain to the next station and walked to the Westland Insurance branch in Columbia Square.  I hat my rain hat and umbrella.  It's only 600 meters from the station.

 

After getting Kimchi, our EV insured, we took it to buy groceries.  The Kona had an 82% charge, exactly the same as when we left it in October.  The tires were a little down.  I've noticed that during winters away, the pressure always falls a few PSI.  They are the low-rolling resistance type that generally have a pressure of 36 psi.  It was too wet during our drive for me to consider stopping for that.  It's a chore done on a fair weather day.

My Car and I Recharged

I hadn't charged my EV since September 27th.  In that amount of time, we'd surely done a lot of errands, even travelling from New Westminster to Richmond and back for Thanksgiving.  So, I'd let it get down to only 39% of a full charge.

Unless on a trip, I generally top up my battery to around 80%.  That is a good amount to be able to get in some distance but prevents the slower charging time and stress on the chemistry from there to 100%.

I drove to Queen's Park which has the closest DC charging in town.  Often, I put in some electricity when we're getting groceries at our Superstore in Coquitlam.  During the last couple of weekends, all four of those BC Hydro fast chargers were busy as we arrived.

That's another reason why I was down to only around a third of a full battery.

Queen's Park is really great location to plug in.  It takes me just a couple of minutes to drive there, and, more importantly, there are always interesting things to walk around and see. At 10:30 am, the weather wasn't great and felt a bit cold.  I went in the municipal arena and noticed that the Vancouver Fire Department Hockey Team was practicing.  

Further along, quite a number of mothers were with young ones.  One mother had taken her child to an adjacent area.  I went to inform her that I had just seen a pair of crows steal some cookies and perhaps a small plastic toy from her unaccompanied stroller!

I was at Queen's Park for more than forty minutes in order for the Kona to get back up to an 85% charge.  EVs tend to take a little longer in colder temperatures.  However, that was a perfect amount of time to see a lot of different things and it provided me a bit of needed relaxation too.  I now have a chemical potential to travel a couple of hundred more kilometers for about $11 CAD (> $8 USD).

Producing Power on the Way to the Store

Jay and I have some friends that keep a Whatsapp group chat open.  It's where we post pictures or talk about what we're doing and a great way to keep up.  For example, one member is landing in Tbilisi, Georgia today.  We get pictures and comments immediately when we wish.  Unfortunately, this has surely killed sending postcards to each other!  

This morning, one member talked about an Ontario potential driver who failed the test because they relied on 'regeneration' in a Tesla rather than using the brake pedal.  I mentioned I most always regenerate in our Hyundai Kona.  I can completely stop by using a 'regeneration paddle' on the steering wheel.  It can set the car's regen level from none to extremely strong.  It can also be used to stop the car at stop signs and traffic lights.

Later in the day, I happened to open my car app and noticed the day's trips.  I added the following to our group chat because we'd mentioned EV regen:

This was our way to the Superstore this morning. My car always ranks me as an "Economical" driver. The other rankings are "Normal" and "Aggressive". The car is set up with three levels of driving characteristics too. I just press a button. They are Eco, Normal, and Sports. I am generally in Normal because it mimics driving a standard gasoline vehicle.

 

I ended up in the neighbouring city of Coquitlam with more in my battery than when I left the house. It was probably a wash as I needed to use more to get home because of the incline. Still it is pretty hard for a gas car to go anywhere and have more free gas in the tank than when it left.

My Car is Powered by Water

Our provincial power company, BC Hydro, operates 82 dam sites. Around 90% of the electricity provided by the utility is generated from hydro sources. They're doing a pretty good job of ramping up fast DC charging in the province. There are a few geographic areas that need increased infrastructure, but planning a road trip is not terribly stressful even though there are a whole lot of extraordinarily high mountain passes around British Columbia. 

Our recent six day trip to Jasper, Alberta and back from Lake Louise was pretty easy. After a bit of experience in learning one's vehicle, getting around can become second nature. I do hope more options become available in that stretch of BC Highway 5 between Merritt and Kamloops. Merritt had wait times, so we continued onwards.  And come on, there's a single charger in Kamloops? That clearly insufficient for road-trippers in the area! 

I have not purchased gasoline since 2018. I haven't a clue as to how much I would have spent on the 1850 KM trip with an archaic internal combustion engine. However, my 'fill up' prices as shown on my BC Hydro app seems pretty reasonable to me. I had to have a/c running on the majority of the trip but cabin heat when in the mountain passes. Most of the trip was at speeds higher than 100 kph.

 

It Really Didn't Add Much to the Experience

The local weather has reached its optimal state in the Lower Mainland of BC.  I got the little window fan out of the closet although it was a step that wasn't really necessary.  I think it is around 25C degrees at the moment. 

We did regular grocery shopping quite early today.  I plugged in the car for a half hour while inside.  I might have to top it up to 100% this week if we go ahead with plans for my birthday-week road trip to the Canadian Rockies.  

On the way back, I also stopped at a car wash in Coquitlam.  I seldom wash Kimchi, our EV.  I try to think of the dirt coating as protection from scratches.  However, if we do take off, I want to see just how many new bugs I can collect.  It must be with a fresh slate, so to speak.  The basic wash was around $9 w/tax.  The colourful light show was definitely worth that price alone, not!

Rinsing Off the Car Cover ... Finally!

During our winters away, the car stays parked downstairs in our building. It always rests for four or five months of the year. When we bought the car, we bought a cover too.  The parking areas in the building get tons of airborne dust and grime.

   

In 2025, we arrived back in town from South Africa on March 16th. So, we took off the somewhat filthy car cover on March 17th. We loosely bundled it up and stuck it in a garbage bag. That bag had been riding around in the back seat for the last three and a half months. 

Yet, the sun was so lovely today, we chose to move it and spray it down at our buildings' outside garden hose. There's a chain-link fence that is long enough for us to hang it over.  Streams of dirty water ran off as water cascaded over it.

   

As long as the car was nearby, Jay hosed off Kimchi, our EV, too. 

Now, the gray cover is drying on our balcony.  Obviously, there's no need to get to certain chores right away.  Although months late, today was perfect for this task.

 

I Love Having a Summer Birthday

We've been back home for exactly a week. Yet, I find myself thinking of our next trip ...

Jay and I have been giving ourselves the gift of travel experiences for our birthdays for a number of years now.  We usually go somewhere for a week or so, occasionally quite far off.  For example, although Jay's next birthday isn't until September, we've had transatlantic flight reservations and an MSC cruise planned for months and months.  On the other hand, my special day is coming up in less than three weeks.  We are still not exactly sure where we'll be going. 

 

I have been holding off to see what I could find for deals on Expedia since the beginning of the year.  In the back of my mind, though, I haven't been worried about our lack of any concrete itinerary.  

We have driven over the Rocky Mountains a couple of times.  The most recent time was years ago though.  I'm pretty sure we'll head there on a road trip again.  Those peaks are the border between British Columbia and Alberta, Canada.

There are only a few major, must-see goals on my unplanned itinerary.  I want to drive along The Icefields Parkway between Banff and Jasper,  I'd also like to go a bit south and see the World Heritage Site of Head-Smashed-in Buffalo Jump.  Lastly, it has also been a very long time since we last visited Calgary, Alberta.  The city is less than 1000 km (620 miles) from here. 

My birthday is an excellent time of year for a road trip.  I got my EV during the very first summer of the pandemic and it has never been farther away that the BC Okanagan.  It must be raring for a road trip too!

Cold Enough for my BC Institute of Technology Hoodie

 

While at Queen's Park, we took the opportunity to take a final look around. I wanted to put a little bit of juice in the EV for over the winter. I charged to 82%. I always do prior to our winters away.  There's nothing special about that number though.

   

It's hard for me to believe that this is the sixth winter we've left the Kona for four or five months! Unjustifiably, I was nervous for the initial one. Hyundai's app doesn't allow for a connection to the vehicle when left for an extended time. I hoped I wouldn't come back to a flat EV. 

I needn't have been concerned. An electric vehicle battery is not like one in a cell phone. EVs are built with industrial-grade components. Only one year, I noticed the battery was down about 1% from when I left it.  The large battery does keep a charge in another small, normal-looking one for the accessories.  Our parking in the building is underground but unheated. It probably only hovers around freezing when the weather is at its coldest in British Columbia.

When I uncover the old girl in mid-March I'm positive the dash will still read an 82% charge.

 

Getting Some Exercise While Charging the Car

I thought I might as well kill two birds with one stone this morning. 

I wanted to do some walking to get my heart rate up. I have been trying to get in three or four hours a week of walking in moderate and vigorous zones. I now enjoy spending a few minutes in peak too. In addition, my car had charge of just 66%.  So, it made perfect sense to drive up to Queen's Park.

   

I sort of thought it might take one hour to walk around the circumference of the park. I knew that my car would get to my usual charge of 80-85% in less than a half hour on the DC fast chargers. Still I decided to give it a try and let the car get more of a charge than I usually put in. When driving around town and taking short trips, the maximum isn't necessary and might actually be a tiny bit stressful on an EV battery that isn't traveling far.

   

I'd never tried to walk on the path I did today. My goal is to keep in Fitbit's Active Zone for about a hour per day. Surprisingly, I found it only took 36 minutes to complete that path! My car had reached 90% of a full charge. Hum, and I hadn't completed my whole hour. 

Then, I remember that it could still get a bit of exercise if I let my car reach its maximum at the slower Level 2 chargers at our City Hall. That building is only a 10-minute walk up a very steep hill from our apartment. So, I parked, plugged, and walked down the hill. One hour later, I got a notification my car was fully charged.

   

I got in another few minutes of hard exercise when walking up to collect my EV.

More Scenes from the Filling Station

It'd been a couple of weeks since I charged my car.  I knew that I could squeeze in about $6 worth of power to get the battery back up a bit over 80%.  I also knew that it'd take around a half hour to do so.  So, I gladly spent the time on a little walk in Queen's Park.  Today, I took a much different path and it took the exact amount of time needed.  It was a bit chilly but beautiful nevertheless.

Wet and Cool

It's been a very rainy Saturday. Everyone here is saying that's good news because this part of BC is technically under drought conditions. I had sort of thought we might head to downtown Vancouver on the SkyTrain today just to see some of the initial cruise ships coming to town for the 2024 Alaskan Cruise Season. Yet, it didn't seem like a very great day to venture outdoors much.

   

Instead, we only drove to Queensborough and stopped at the Walmart there. We generally pick up things at the one in uptown New Westminster because it is less than two kilometers up the hill from our apartment. We do find the one we visited today has a bit better and larger selection of groceries.

Pretty Day to Charge the EV

My EV's battery was quite low.  We fly away for the winter on Tuesday. I will leave my Hyundai Kona at around an 80% charge.  This is the fifth winter I'm leaving the car for four or five of our coolest months.  The car is parked in the unheated underground space of our condo building.  The most I've ever seen the gauge drop was 2% during our extended absences.  The car automatically keeps a small, normal-type, accessory car battery topped up from the large EV one.  Power loss is negligible when the car is switched off.

Rather than rushing around at the last minute, I wanted to get it topped up because it was sitting at around 44%.  The weather in New Westminster was -1C this morning.  I thought it might take a while to put in approximately 30 kWh of DC power.

Yet, what a great morning to walk around Queen's Park!  Our city's changing stations have become quite popular for quick charging.  I sort of lucked out and didn't have to wait.  In the nearly 40 minutes it took, I was able to see quite a lot of beautiful scenery.

The 'snow bank' was really just old surfacing from the municipal ice rink.  With today's temperature in the single digits, it wasn't melting very quickly.

Road Noise

What the hell? It's a mere four days before we park the car and leave for winter.  Now, I had something wrong with my car's tire?

Although the in-dash pressure gauge looked fine, I could hear a vomp-vomp-vomp sound when driving at low speeds. I stopped to check what sounded like the front tire but it surely looked fine. Back in the car, it sounded like a flap of a re-skinned semi-truck tire was repeatedly hitting the cement. 

Jay got out in the parking area on the roof of the mall.  I wanted him to see what it looked like when the car was moving. I passed him and he noticed right away the noise was actually from the passenger side back.

 

I dug this stone out of the deep tread. That was it?  It's next to a Canadian dime for comparison.  I'm a few years shy of 50 years on the road and I never had this happen before. It was a relief knowing that I'd not be replacing a tire because my car still has less than 12,000 km on the odometer.

My EV Charging Story Today

It'd been quite a while since I last plugged in the car.  Even though several weeks had passed, I still had around 53% of my battery left.  But, when I saw that it was sunny, I drove up to Queen's Park to plug into the quick DC chargers.   I generally charge to around 81% on quick chargers.  That took an unusual 35 minutes today as the weather is getting a bit cooler and lower temperatures can add to charging times!  I really enjoyed my walk though.  My car gets green power, and I get healthy exercise.

As I was driving away, I thought we might go on a trip tomorrow.  Humm.  The weather forecast shows a nice sunny break tomorrow.  I am not sure if I've ever completely charged this two-year-old battery, ever!  Why not fill it up, so to speak?

So when driving past New Westminster City Hall, I pulled in at Level 2 (240v) chargers.  That is only several blocks from the apartment but on a very steep hill.  The maximum time limit for charging at that location is two hours.  I walked down the hill and went for a swim at home.  I still have another hour left.  By then, my Hyundai Kona's battery should be completely full.  Today's total cost will be less than $US 7.50 for around 240 km of electricity.  A bonus is I got in some exercise too!

Wet But Not Too Wild

 

The first day of this week looks a great deal like the beginning of last week. I don't mind experiencing a few of these totally rainy, Metro-Vancouver days. It's good practice to remember how those who stay during the area's winters live. I enjoyed experiencing the decidedly calming effect of a dark, wet day. 

I ran uptown and parked on the roof of the uptown shopping mall. You see, I didn't wash my car all summer as we were in a drought with watering restrictions. I came up from the mall and found a rag in the car. I did a once-over quick wipe. Some of the road dust doesn't move without a little added effort. At least the base coat of grime was repositioned. I do have a new bottle of car soap to crack open before we leave at the end of the month. I bought it after having Bing AI explain that neither dish nor laundry soap was good for a car's wax job.

Five Dollars of Slot Play in Three Minutes

I had an interesting errand to run this morning.  Jay and I went to the Starlight Casino in Queensborough.  

We are not gamblers; however, we do have BC Encore cards.  They are loyalty cards for all BC casinos and used to manage accounts in the slots.  We got them primarily because they allow for food discounts in the buffets and restaurants.  

As it is my birthday month, I received a free $5.  So, I spent around three minutes of my time blowing through that amount.  It amounted to only about ten useless spins.  We were already in Queensborough so we stopped at the Value Village and Walmart Supercenter.  The traffic over that bridge was slow, more so going than coming home.

It's also been a big day for packages.  We have had Amazon deliveries each day for the last five or so.  Today was Prime Day and consequently, more are on their way.  We buy a number of items to use ourselves each month.  

We're also starting to collect items that we'll take to Sri Lanka this winter.  Today, another type of box arrived from China via Canada Post.  I picked out a 4G LTE router/wifi modem that uses a phone SIM.  I have an account on AliExpress.  This model is an improvement over a defective one I brought last time.  The new version still allows the connection of ten devices.  However, this is truly portable because it has a power bank built in too.  Data is cheap in Sri Lanka and I'll get an 'all-you-can-eat' account at the airport when we arrive.  This device is much better at sharing than the wifi hotspot built into iOS and Android phones.