ME & MY 2021 TESLA MODEL 3, 'THE PEARL'COMING IN NOVEMBER: BUCKET LISTING ACROSS AMERICA
I had driven my beloved Prius for 13 years. She had 17 years on her, and over 200K miles, and I figured with her hybrid battery replaced in 2017 she’d be good to go for another 100K miles or so.
My brother, Jeff, took a ride with me a month or two back and pointed out the roar of the engine - Prius’s aren’t supposed to roar - and some vibrating, among other things.
That was all part of the charm, I explained.
Other people don’t find it as charming, I guess.
Anyway, at some point between that ride and my birthday in March he decided it was time for a new car.
I’m told that he considered a new Prius, at first. Instead, at some point, he decided to order a Tesla.
I wasn’t privy to the decision-making - I had no idea any of this was even going on. We’re not the kind of family that drives fancy, sporty little battery-powered cars. In fact, we’re not the kind of family that gives big-ticket items like vehicles as birthday presents. Jeff has had a long history as a fighter against climate change, first as race director of ‘green’ multisport events like the Musselman Triathlon, the Portland Triathlon, and the Seneca7. (I, for my part, handled public relations and digital media for each). He also co-founded the Council for Responsible Sport, which worked to help other events more environmentally-friendly. We all, as a family, followed my brother’s lead, adopting a more environment-conscious lifestyle: our homes are powered by solar power, we’ve all driven hybrid vehicles at some point, and we recycle like it’s going out of style.
But a Tesla? That would have seemed excessive to me. My brother drives a 1970s-era camper van these days, and I was perfectly happy with my 2005 Prius. A Tesla?
My brother braved COVID to take the train down to Brooklyn and pick up the car. I’m not sure where he hid it in the days between its delivery and my birthday, but when I pulled in to my parents’ driveway for my birthday lunch it was apparently parked in the neighbor’s driveway; they, in on the lan, had obscured it with their car. At some point during the meal Jeff snuck my keys out of my pocket, raced with my Prius up the street, and traded it for the Tesla, moving it into the space my car had been parked in. Then, after replacing the keys in my jacket pocket, everyone waited.
At some point, under the guise of needing to retrieve items from the garage, he asked me if I would mind going outside to move my car to the other side of the driveway. I was a little surprised - we hadn’t even had any birthday cake yet - but I agreed. I didn’t even notice my father going out the front door to video it all, or think it strange that my mother sprang up to leash the puppy and take her outside at the same time.
I walked outside and spotted the car, but it took me a few seconds to realize that my own car had disappeared. I was annoyed for a moment - who in the hell would steal a 2004 Toyota? - and then I spotted my dad rolling the camera.
We’re not the kind of family that gives each other cars as presents. I can’t stress that enough. Those are families on television commercials, and I always roll my eyes at how cringey they seem. So it took me a minute to realize what was happening. I was getting a car for my birthday?? It took me another minute to realize this thing was a Tesla. A new Tesla.
My parents and brother were beyond excited, but to me it didn’t seem real at first.
In summer 2020 I was diagnosed with Stage IV neuroendocrine cancer. My appointments for injections and scans are in various cities in the area, each about an hour away. Those appointments seem to be happening more and more lately - I had three the week of my birthday alone. My parents, brother, and so many friends are more than willing to give me rides, and often do - but I enjoy driving, and I’m not a very good passenger, so being able to transport myself - that’s important. I can understand why anyone thinking of me driving an hour each way in my 17 year-old Toyota would be nervous. A new car, my brother felt, would help ease the anxiety of everyone.
Once everything is situated my brother figured I might want to embark on a ‘road trip’ of sorts - I have friends and family up and down the east coast that I’d love to see again after COVID. If I’m being honest, there’s no way I’d ever have trusted the Prius more than an hour or two from home - I babied that thing for the entire time I had it, but it had 200,000 miles. When I returned to New York from Florida in 2016 I knew that would be our last great road trip together. When I was diagnosed I figured my days of road tripping were finished, as well. Now I have a Tesla with miles in the triple digits - how can I not endeavor to take to the road one more time?
I get tired often, but they make a mattress for this car that lets you sleep in the back. And it has a glass roof, so you can literally sleep under the stars. There’s even a simulated fireplace in the control center tablet on the dash! And Netflix, and other streaming services. Not sure how much EV-camping I’ll be doing, but I may be doing a spare bedroom tour of the eastern seaboard once boating season is over. Me and the Elonmobile, coming soon to a city near you…
I have to thank my brother, Jeff, for this amazing gift - and my parents, and neighbors Mickey and Marsha, for not spoiling the surprise.
Day 6: First Trip Around the Lake
Six days into my EV ownership journey I decided to take a trip around Seneca Lake.
Seneca Lake has been a part of the fabric of my family since before I was born. My grandfather purchased land on it in the 1930s, and built a small boathouse to dry dock his sailboat. That was later expanded to include a bedroom and a kitchen, providing a summer home for he and my grandmother. In 2000 the structure, now around 60 years old, burned in an electrical fire. It would be replaced by a house up on the cliff - Seneca Lake, as one of the 11 glacially-formed Finger Lakes, is known for them. Since then it’s served as a home, or summer home, for all of us.
When I turned 16, the first solo ‘big trip’ I took was in my 1986 Ford Escort - also a hand-me-down from my grandfather. He called the car his ‘buttercup’ - it was bright yellow, with rust spots touched up with various shades of yellow touch-up or spray paint. It was the last remnants of his independence, and the first of mine.
My first time leaving home was an overnight trip to the cottage, and I loved every minute of it. The cottage became my home base, and my car my ride to new places I’d never been. I loved that feeling! Ever since, something about driving out to the Finger Lakes and just going for long, slow drives, has refueled me. That first car was my ticket to freedom, and many of the vehicles I had since served as the same.
Freedom, for me, meant discovering places like the little hamlet of Dresden - home of the Naval Sea Systems Command and the Seneca Lake Sonar Testing Facility. (It’s a big barge out in the middle of the lake, floating at about 600 feet of depth, and how they get it to stay there has always fascinated me). Or the time that friends and I crested a hill along the east side of the lake and saw lights on the horizon belonging to the Village of Watkins Glen - we were stunned that civilization existed so far down the lake, and probably felt like Amerigo Vespucci when he floated up to the shores of this land so long ago.
(This was in the days before widespread internet and GPS use - it would be difficult to not know what was coming up on your route these days, and I kind of miss that feeling).
My trips around the lake had slowed in recent years, due in part to my feeling a need to keep the miles off the Prius, which I figured would be my last car - needed to make her last, right? Long, slow drives to nowhere left me with pangs of guilt, now, and I’d probably made fewer than a half dozen circumnavigations of the lake in the past 12 months.
Before I drove any real distance in any other direction, I had to begin with one symbolic trip around this lake that I love so much…
The trip down the west shore was relatively uneventful, in part because I’d decided to combine the trip with a grocery pickup in Watkins Glen - something of a guilt-free excuse to go, I guess - and I was running a bit late. I stopped in Dresden and took some pictures by the water, with the aforementioned barge in the background, but they turned out to be trash. Then, for the rest of the trip, I zipped along toward Watkins, 45 miles south.
This car is a head-turner, and turn some heads it did. At one point a New York State Trooper turned around and followed me for a little bit of a distance - not sure if he had seen the temporary registration sticker and wanted to call in the plate, or if he was hoping to snag a speeder. (Sir, I drove a Prius for 13 years before this… speeding isn’t in my vocabulary). Others, doing yard work or standing outside talking to neighbors in this amazing weather, stopped what they were doing to turn and watch the car drive by.
After getting groceries, and some compliments from the kid who loaded them into the trunk, I headed back up the other side of the lake. I’d planned to stop at two waterfront vistas for some car pics but skipped them due to mud left over from snow melt. I’d probably made it around 2/3 of the lake before I found a spot that was truly photo worthy. That spot was Hector Falls, one of the highest waterfalls in New York State, and it was flowing, the result of the snow melt I mentioned. I parked on the bridge, right in between the signs that order no stopping on the bridge, and rushed to get a video with the water gushing in the background.
My next stop was Sampson State Park. A former naval base and Air Force base during World War II, it has been a place for camping, boating, and swimming since before I was born. And, for me and my friends, a place for car photos. I brought my 1992 Mustang here, and my 25th anniversary Mustang convertible, and my 1996 Mustang, and took photos of each at some point during my formative years. Then I grew up, and began buying cars that were the responsible choice. Nobody takes a picture of a Kia Rio - or a Prius.
This new car made me want to take pictures of my car again, for the first time since shortly after I graduated college.
I’d forgotten what it feels like, having a car that you love, a car that you care about, a car that you want to show off. It feels amazing. My last go-round was before the days of social media - I couldn’t Instagram, or Facebook, or TikTok any of my Mustangs. With this new car, all of those would be in play… and I’d be joining a very crowded field of other Tesla drivers proud as fuck of their rides.
I should note that, despite my and many others’ enthusiasm for this type of photography, there will surely be those who view this as nothing more as an exercise in boastfulness. A “flex”, as the kids call it on TikTok. Chris is just flexing his Elonmobile again, people may say. And I’m okay with that. I love photography - I eagerly await the release of the newest iPhone every year, and focus on those camera upgrades during the Apple keynotes. And while I do love taking pictures of scenery - you can see some of my favorite Seneca Lake shots here - for me, my best photos are taken when I have a muse. My boat, a 1977 Trojan Tri-Cabin, has its own website - I may be one of very few people taking shot after shot after shot of a 1970s-era cabin cruiser. And my puppy - also Trojan - has a website, as well. The moment a friend heard I had been gifted a Tesla he asked the question that has probably been on everyone’s minds: “Does your car have a website, yet?” I laughed, at the time - but then I took this trip around the lake, and snapped some photos.
This car was made to be photographed. And I would most definitely be posting the photos.
If you get tired of seeing the same Tesla Model 3 photographed over and over, check out Trojanyacht.com for photos of the boat. Or Trojanyacht.com/pup for photos of the puppy. I’m passionate about each of these things, and I thank you for letting me share that passion with you.
Day 7: Going Home… And Finding Superchargers!
After taking a trip around Seneca Lake I decided another symbolic drive was in order. So, the next day, I headed east down the New York State Thruway, making the one-hour trip to Syracuse, the city around which I grew up and went to college.
MORE TO COME…
