2500 mi. for free? Nope.

For those of you following along with the 'for free' trip reports: 900 mi.for free, and the somewhat related 50K mi. for free we have this latest missive regarding a little trip to SandyEggo. After careful planning and consideration (OK, 20 min. on PlugShare.com) Eugene to San Diego and back for free looked do-able.
          Just to get this out up front: EV 'Public Charging' vendors used during this trip and
          their relative success rates in %% and number of (charge attempts.)

Bars are success rate in percent.

So, the whole thing was somewhat spoiled by the less than stellar competence at charging vendor EVGO.
More on that later.

Making the trip for free-ish in a Nissan Leaf ePlus seemed feasible. Granted, the Nissan still sports the ancient and creaky CHAdeMO fast charging connector, which, while it was amazing in 2011 is now the rarest, slowest and most likely to be broken/blocked of the available fast charging types. Instead of the current CCS standard.  Translation: Don't buy a Leaf for distance travel. OTOH: Adds to the adventure! ...Well that and it's the dead of winter wherein EV's get crappy range and passes can be impassable.
We did mention adventure, right?
As core components in the plan, we had a new "First 30 days for free at EVCS" account set up by our traveling companion (I had already used my free 30 days in the last post of this type) which would meet around 50-60% of our charging requirements. The second major component was all the new free Caltrans charging stations that have been put onto rest-stops in California, which should handle most of the remaining 40-50%. Way to go CA!
In this instance they have made good use of the money dumped on them due to VW getting caught with it's hand in the cookie jar (see 'dieselgate'), which partially makes up for their poor performance during the rollout of the West Coast Electric Highway ten years ago.
Any remaining little charging should fit into the $200+ left in the 'free charging' account we got with EVGO when purchasing the car*

Executive summary: For persons with minimal attention span.
(No executives were executed during the execution of this exemplan ;-)
           2500 miles, 19 charge stops, total billing $91 or about 3.6 cents/mile. ~700KWh total.
                                                                 (Compare with Gas at $0.12-0.20/mile)

Day one, Start at 100% charge.   
First stop Grants Pass 120 mi Down to 26%   EVCS free 45kw, 1.2 hrs ~50 KW onboard. Lunch stop.
Cold and wet and headwinds and heaters do not make for great range numbers.

2nd stop Yreka Carl's Junior: 50 Mi (Siskiyou passes) Down to 50%
EVGO clusterfuck. EVGO is supposedly a completely cross-account billing partner with ChargePoint. Except NOT!
   Failure #1: EVGO RFID Card. We checked this with EVGO support before leaving. Yep it's the right one!
So of course it doesn't work. Chargepoint later helpfully points out that it's not a ChargePoint card. Thanks for that, I must have been blind. It does work on actual EVGO stations as you'll see later.
   Failure #2: the EVGO app won't complete registration with an existing account because the phone# provided is 'already in use' despite that exact phone number showing up correctly in their web based account management screen. ...only fails with the app. Yeah, that app, the one you need to use to get the charger going. Extensive attempts at phone and email support, reinstall app. clear out cache/data, reinstall again. No joy, but lots of frustration. The people I'm dealing with are really nice, they just can't fix it. They spent a couple calls, several emails and did finally get this fixed so the app would actually load, about TEN DAYS after we started. Even then we had no luck getting it to actually work. I think 'abject failure' was mentioned earlier.
   Failure #3: The phone support person suggests using their web portal, since all that information is correct.  It's almost impossible to operate on the phone screen due to a number of bad design decisions. Small very light green text on a bright white background? For use outside? Really? And then once you get it deciphered the advertising they have added on top MUST have it's screen realestate, covering up important parts of the form.
So of course it doesn't work. "Failed to Initialize"   More than once. Nobody knows why.
We're too far from the next viable charger so;
   Finally we drag out the ChargePoint app and it't starts the charger right up and bills up $13.75 for the charge. Yay!  ...except we have money already on account at EVGO to the tune of $236. ...that apparently we can't use.      45kw peak, 0.75 hrs ~28 KW onboard

    3rd Stop: EVGO Orland exit 900 Newville Rd.  155 miles and about 9% left, gotta charge!
So, it's EVGO. "The appearance of actual charging!" ...ya know, without any actual charging.
    Failure #4 & #5 More than half the chargers here are non-functional to begin-with. The two forlorn examples remaining wake right up, screens respond, the RFID card works the account authenticates, the charger initializes and starts charge ... and complete failure. "Error Start Signal" (from the car) so of course it's the car's fault. Previous reports from this location so indicate (according to Plugshare posts).  Thus we don't even bother calling, after all we still have eleven miles of range left and the next charger is only 7 miles down the road.
What could go wrong?
    Nothing went wrong, technically this is the 4th stop, but we're counting it as #3.2  and despite being in the northbound rest stop (when we're traveling south) the Free CalTrans charger there works like a champ. Well,  after we help move the guy who has thrown-up all over the inside of his vehicle and parked at the only EV stall, the farthest one along. He was really nice, except for the smell.
    So, CalTrans: 162 miles actually (remember it's downhill from the passes). from 9% to 60% in less than an hour. Pretty good for free. We're doing this CalTrans thing again! Free is nice and it works despite having the same exact connector assembly, screen and software as the EVGO stuff that just failed spectacularly, granted it's the previous software version that hasn't been 'improved' to make CCS (non Nissan LEAF) connections faster.

So we get back on the freeway and arrive at the night's stop at Fairfield Inn in Sacramento. This place was chosen in part because they have charging from EVCS, therefore free to us, plus the rooms are nice (except the noisy heatpump) and the price is reasonable.
The battery had a hard day and takes two hours to go from 4% to 95%. The EVCS chargers are not fast, even with a battery that's not over-warmed-up. Still what do we care, overnight stop.

Next day:

With near 100% full and warmer temps. we looked at maybe trying to make it all the way to Caltrans at Kettleman City. Could -almost- do it but 212 is a lot of highway miles to be assuming about.
Fortunately there was a good short half way solution.
Westleys Rest Stop, 113 miles, CalTrans Free EV charging. We took it from 50% to 68% in about 20 min. The interesting part (to us) is that it didn't show up on the PlugShare or Caltanns maps nor was there a sign. We just stopped for the restroom and there it was. The original plan was to hit the northbound rest stop there since is IS on the map. Note that a number of the CalTrans charging network are not on the map, and some that are, are NOT  reporting their in-use/functional status.
      Failure #6: NOT EVGO!  Yay?  Kettleman City CalTrans Maint. Depot
CalTrans EV chargers here, two units both with the same problem. The touchscreens wouldn't register 'touches' and since you have to push some virtual buttons to get the charge to start...
To add insult to injury the phone number prominently displayed for help plays a nice "This number is not yet in service" jingle for you. ...this was supposed to be a free charging stop so it was scheduled for a bigger charge. Oops.   [Edit: Comments left on Plugshare later indicate that the responses might just be slow. Apparently if you wait about two min. after plugging in, the indicator, for one of the two chargers, -might- turn green and allow you to hit the Start button. We were just impatient?]

We went down the street to the Electrify America EV Charging stations to rub elbows with the well heeled EV folks. Several $80K+ vehicles there. We bought just enough to ensure passage to the Tejon Pass Rest Stop CalTrans EV station about 110 miles south. $18.06 for roughly 42Kw while we walked to a restaurant. 

Tejon Pass EV Chargers, Caltrans, Free
Two out of the four were working which was good because only one was in use. The car really needed it after crawling 4200 feet elevation up the Grapevine. 15% to 80% in 45 min.
...which was plenty since LA is all down hill from there.

It's fun to have the very responsive acceleration of the EV during the cut-and-thrust of near rush-hour LA traffic. Still took almost three hours to make it to Anaheim.
Oddly enough the nearest EV charging to the Disney complex is an EVCS 4-stall at a medical center. Since we had to run across LA to the Burbank airport twice in rush-hour traffic (actually six times total for the trip)  Two of the chargers there worked great. Plugshare says one is intermittent and one non-functional (about par-for-the-course) so we didn't try those. We charged there something like five-six times. Worked great although the location seems somewhat sketchy. Walking distance to a store and a couple eateries. Our first time ever at El Pollo Loco. Woo!

Rolling over 1000 miles and 20 Hrs at the same time.

In theory, a full charge in Anaheim should be enough to make it 95 mi. to San Diego and back, right? Well, with a little local fussing about things looked a little tight so we stopped on the way back at the San Clemente city hall to give EVGO yet another chance to fail, which they did! Fail that is. RFID: Fail. EVGO App: Fail. Chargepoint App: Success! ...but we're $18 poorer.

This was enough to make it through LA and out to the Tejon Pass free CalTrans location. Still worked great although one of the four chargers was down. We had a 5 min. wait.  It was about 1:25 to go from 9% to 85%. We brought lunch with us just for this.

Little stop at the Same set of CalTrans rest-stops/chargers as we had going south. Free is good. and that took us all the way to Sacramento and the same Fairfield Inn/EVCS chargers. Both Marriott properties here have EVCS chargers and the all (8) seemed to be working. I wish that wasn't amazing.

Off we go in the morning and we pretty much used the same chargers going northward. Free at the rest stop, then another rest-stop and then over the pass (with lots of snow and ice!) and ChargePoint at Grants Pass. Should have gotten more than 80% charge level there since it was a downpour, blowing and 38.deg. We had a possible issue with getting home given the conditions, and opted to stop at the EVCS station at 7-Feathers Casino. (Note that the charger is actually on the other side of the freeway)
Here we were surprised to find that the 'Free!'  month that EVCS gives you for starting an account only really works for the first 200KWh you use during that month. Because of timing we actually got more like 230 KWh before getting the warning (both eMail -and- text) and getting dumped into  a 'bonus rate' of $0.29/KWh. which is still better than their regular rate of $50/Month -or- $0.49/KWh. ...so they did fine. In fact, EVCS was the star of the trip.

What did we learn on this trip? Pretty much same as we knew before:

Reliable long distance EV travel, ...should be done in a Tesla.

If not Tesla, then it will take somewhat more bother and time. In this case 2-3 hours extra over 12 days, but we just pulled out a book and read to fill the time, so no great loss. The heat and/or AC continue to work while you're charging if you do it right.

EVCS has REALLY upped their game. Taking over the remainders of the WCEH (see above) from Webato/AeroVironment ('AV' major defense contractor) who had really only set up the initial charging network along i5 and the coast in WA and OR (and bits of CA) to get a bunch of federal contract dollars, and EVCS have turned it into something that mostly works. AV had left an 'EV Desert' from Ashland to nearly Sacamento, making it almost impossible to make it down into CA without a 300 mi.range EV. EVCS and CalTrans have filled that gap at last. Eight years later. Yay-ish.

One could argue that this level of planning should not be necessary, and for Tesla owners it is not. The "Have Not's" have, as usual, a more difficult time of it, and trying to do it for free just adds to the complexity. We would probably have made it on zero dollars had EVGO's advertised cross-billing thing with ChargePoint actually worked (or if Anything EVGO had worked at all) although we'd still be facing that $18 at ElectrifyAmerica. Darn.
Close, but no cigar

There's a good Youtube about this.

Q&A

"Hey with my gas guzzler I'd have made half as many stops and been quick doing it!"

No you wouldn't. Between your tiny bladder and unwillingness to have your gas gauge go lower than one quarter tank you'd have been off the road almost the same number of times. Given meal breaks (when we were charging) and the somewhat longer stops we had sometimes, I doubt you'd have gained more than an hour or two overall. And, you'd have paid around $400 for that time. Go away.

"Is it REALLY this much bother traveling with an EV?"

No. You just buy a Tesla.

"But Elon is ICKY!"

Elon is not Tesla. It's mostly owned by and run by other folks. You just don't hear about that because,  well, Media.

And remember here we're talking here about our use of just about the worst long distance travel EV. Even then it's still very do-able. Just about any CCS charging port equipped car would have an easier time of it. Nissan won't convert the Leaf to CCS because it would cost money (and they're assholes, er, corporate personages. Same thing.)

"Hey, the numbers don't add up!"
We did start off with 100% charge, which should I guess show up as 60KWh  "Home $6 (1)" the rest is just rounding errors.

*Nissan had a deal with EVGO a couple years back wherein they provided the first $300 of charging on your new EVGO account for 'free' and given that it's over 100 miles to the nearest EVGO charging station, that hasn't seen much use except during trips to PDX where we've managed to run up a bill of a bit over sixty dollars during a four year period. We have, by the way, never gotten their app or RFID card to start a charging session at a ChargePoint charging station, something they continue to advertise.  Although to be fair, it might have worked once on the phone with their support folks after standing in the rain while on hold for awhile. Yes, hardly a ringing endorsement.  We have heard from people for whom EVGO has worked just fine. Our experience is simply different.