www.electricfelix.com
Ridiculous? I am your biggest fan already. Lovely adventure, should do the same actually!(P.S - Before anyone says what we are doing is ridiculous - We know, that's part of the adventure! Last time we went round France was in a 30 year old Mini which was challenging for other reasons. Want to be a bit greener this time!!)
Thanks Felix, yes I think you're right about the crowds at charging points over the next couple of Summers! There are going to be thousands of new enthusiastic EV owners like me desperate to give longer distances a try. This is the reason I am looking specifically for places with multiple chargers so that I won't feel too guilty delaying drivers of cars with far superior rapid charging!!Ridiculous? I am your biggest fan already. Lovely adventure, should do the same actually!
I recommend reading my EV guide to France well before you go. It is available free of charge for everybody, because the situation in France is still "messy". Charging wise.
Total is now expanding their HPC network, lots of gray here, still. Summer will be exciting, travel permitting I expect a crowd you will not believe at the fast chargers. You can always get in touch with me about personal travel recommendations. I run a patreon page, if you sign up you can request personal EV travel advice for all your future adventures.
For travel inspiration I recommend reading my blogs with the EQC and the e-tron around France, to give you an idea about the infrastructure. If you want to find more about my travels with for example the DS3 and the Ioniq around France I suggest checking out my Polarsteps page.
Hi Ric and thanks very much for your detailed reply! I had an equally exciting journey back to the UK from Indonesia before the first lockdown which took me to Tokyo and Helsinki! Clearly not a story for an EV forum though! Glad you made it back ok.Not ridiculous at all! Its a great adventure as electricfelix has said! Story time ...
Not sure of the route you are taking but early March 2020 I made a trip to Geneva and back. I will detail my experience below to give you an idea. Since then the Maingau card no longer offers reasonable Ionity charging costs. Back in March 2020 I was paying €0.39/kW I recall. Now its double that! I have a Charge Point RFID which does offer slightly cheaper Ionity charging in Europe and can be used with Instavolt in the UK. The Maingau card is still useful for 50kW rapids especially in Austria/Switzerland/Netherlands I believe. I also took an Izivia card, KiWhi card, ChargeMap card, Plug Surfing card, Révéo and a Shell Recharge card! Its worth setting accounts up for all of these. With so many accounts I started a log book to keep notes on charging and costs.
So to the trip ... I charged to 81% at the EuroTunnel terminal. Don't rely on these working however. Best to use the Instavolt nearby before entering the EuroTunnel terminal complex. After a swift 35 minute crossing via the EuroTunnel (I had to remove the MG's aerial due to low clearance on the train) I set off to my first French rapid, a superb collection of four Ionity CCS ultra-rapids and a standard 3 head 50kW rapid charger at Aire de Rely to 88% (Izivia Corri-Door not working). Next was at an Izivia Corri-Door charger that actually worked at the Cambrai Intermarche to 79%.
A final free top up (to 81%) at Aire d’Urveilles Total service station on the autoroute got me to the first night stay at a BritHotel in Reims Nord. They do not have EV charging available however for overnight guests.
Next day the only available chargers in Reims were multiple Ionity chargers west of the city on the A4 towards Paris. Charged to 81% headed west to the first exit and returned east and topped up to 86% from the Ionity opposite the one previously used. Its a 23km round trip to the charger and back as someone had already warned me about. Though there is a service tunnel connecting west and eastbound service stations, its only for use by autoroute employees! I did ask but was refused and I kindly suggested that it would be great if EVs were allowed to use the service tunnel due to the lack of other rapids in the Reims area. The kind lady promised to pass on my suggestion to the autoroute company!
The Izivia Corri-Door charger at Aire de Sommesous is also one of the broken units but luckily it was easy to get to Troyes on the last 81% charge from the Ionity unit arriving with 18%. In Troyes I spent the night at BritHotel Comptes de Champagne (recommended as Troyes does not have many rapids) where I had requested on booking the use of the 7Kw fast charger socket in their secure garage. There is only one socket in the garage. At a public car park nearby there are two additional type 2 sockets. The hotel charged €7.00 for parking but this included the charge to 100% overnight. Happy with that!
The final day took me to Geneva via Aire de Langres-Perrogny Ionity rapids (89%), and Aire du Jura Ionity making sure I charged to 95% before climbing over the Jura Mountains to Gex. In Geneva I charged the next day at the airport but would not recommend it as its horrendously expensive. They charge a connection fee, a per kWh fee and a by the minute fee as well as a parking charge on top! Better to head to Signy Avia Auto garage in the hills not far north of Nyon if you need a charge in that area. I used the Maingau card there.
After three days of skiing with friends, France was shut down completely and I had to make a dash back! After plugging in the granny charger at my friends house, I left the next morning climbing back over the Jura. It was chaos, police, riot squads, 15km traffic jams south of Paris and general population in a state of panic. I won't bore you with the charging details but luckily I managed to book a ferry from Dieppe to Newhaven with the confirmation coming through five minutes before they closed the booking system. At Dieppe there were about 80 people who had just turned up but they would not sell them tickets. I was waved on by a smile and congratulations from the ticket staff! 10 cars and a few lorries on board. I do not want to repeat that return journey again under those circumstances!
I understand that slowly the IziVia rapids that were faulty are being replaced along the French autoroutes. Another tip is that Total are rolling out rapid chargers too (I used one to the west of Paris at Aire de Limour-Janvy) on the way to Dieppe). Here they had quite expensive ultra rapids but also a 50kW rapid at half the price so I used that as the MG ZS EV does not really benefit from ultra rapid charge speeds.
From my log book and various accounts, the whole trip from the South of Scotland to Geneva and back was 2126 miles (3421km). Total trip cost £126.40 (6p/mile).
Efficient EV, fast charging, lots of locations .... problem solved let's hope the rest of the industry copy and paste (to be fair Ionity are on the right, if be expensive track)
I may try a slower Departmental road trip hunting down hotels with fast chargers. It was expensive on the Péage but I was in a rush to get the skis on, and a rush to escape lockdown on the way back!
Thanks for your input.Ridiculous? I am your biggest fan already. Lovely adventure, should do the same actually!
I recommend reading my EV guide to France well before you go. It is available free of charge for everybody, because the situation in France is still "messy". Charging wise.
Total is now expanding their HPC network, lots of gray here, still. Summer will be exciting, travel permitting I expect a crowd you will not believe at the fast chargers. You can always get in touch with me about personal travel recommendations. I run a patreon page, if you sign up you can request personal EV travel advice for all your future adventures.
For travel inspiration I recommend reading my blogs with the EQC and the e-tron around France, to give you an idea about the infrastructure. If you want to find more about my travels with for example the DS3 and the Ioniq around France I suggest checking out my Polarsteps page.
The route national stretch between Riems and Chaumont through st Dizier and Joinville? is good, with sections of dual carriageway, and easy route following, saves a big wedge of toll is shorter and is only about 1/4 hour slower. Never done it in an ev though! May not be any convenient chargers.Thanks everybody who has contributed. I have an MG ZS that I'd like to drive to Aosta at some stage: I used to live there and have friends although none where I can use a granny charger. My route would probably be via the Portsmouth ferries as I live just a few miles away.
The expense of French autoroutes and the associated chargers would tend me towards a slower trip with overnight stop(s): as I'm retired time is not quite so important. Has anybody any tales of trips to Italy generally avoiding tolls? It's appreciated that for certain legs, the A40 from Macon perhaps, it would be sensible to use the autoroute, particularly in winter. In the Val d'Aosta I always tend to use the SS26 as the tolls are so high.
Ferries from Portsmouth include Le Havre and Caen and we normally use the overnight to LH and the post lunchtime from Caen on the way back as we do an overnighter as in winter you don't want to have to push to get a particular ferry.. For now we'll still use a diesel van, but at some stage I'd like to introduce the many variables involved in using an EV! All information helps!Just seen you will be going through central France from Portsmouth rather down the east side.. sorry can't help much. East/West tolls between Calais and places like Chartres are not horrific...
Of around 220 nationwide locations 185+ are down. Only some DBT chargers (certain brand) are still up and running, mostly delivering costly 40kW charging. Time based payment, which seems hilarious because they're underperforming, which makes Corri-Door extra money. Check up on my French EV guide before summer, I expect big updates hopefully including more Total HPC's (between Paris and Lille is a good start), more Allego HPC's (Toulouse for now) and Fastned hopefully arrives before summer near Paris/Lyon but depends on Ministry of Transport (FR) as well.What's the latest Corri-Door status?
Thanks for this. It does seem a bit of a challenge. I would like to use Ionity, but the costs are very high and I won't get the benefit of the super fast charge. Does anyone know if there is a way to get a month trial to access their lower rates rather than a 12 month contract?Bit of a faff but try charge map and then look into the details of a charger (pick some random ones on route) the cards they take .. I found plug surfing covered my needs (as a back up) and no need to pay £xx down for a card etc (might have changed now) ... there is quite often some overlap between "providers" so the Shell app / new motion card might also work ... issue with apps and chargers is network coverage through so always worth having an RFID as back up.
It does all take a load of planning, you can go off autoroute and pick up some cheap/free charging at Aldi (or Lidl, I still get the 2 confused) ... eurotunnel folkestone is down so maybe use the Instavolt for a quick top up before getting on the chunnel ?
VW We Charge might offer a deal for our Seat friend ? Not sure if Kia/Hyundai have announced deals now they are part of the network. Outside of the Tesla network it's still looking a little complicated, overnight stop with charge might also help
