Yellowstone travel/charging advice

[teartags]

Our best chance of changing things is to talk directly to decision makers. Please email the Wyoming Tourism Board directly about how lack of DCFC is reducing your travel dollars spent in the state.

I've personally contacted them and received no responses. But the more they hear, the more they will care.

Thank you for this. I live down in CO and make trips up to WY regularly. It's a charging desert and requires careful planning.
What address are you writing to them? I got on that site and there is no easy "write to us here" link that I can find. I'd really rather not sign up for their newsletter.

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[BigSkies]

Thank you for this. I live down in CO and make trips up to WY regularly. It's a charging desert and requires careful planning.
What address are you writing to them? I got on that site and there is no easy "write to us here" link that I can find. I'd really rather not sign up for their newsletter.

Their email addresses are listed directly on that page. I never found a centralized inbox.

I wrote to them as a group, but maybe sending to them as individuals would have more impact?

 

[Antonio]

So I've found 2 places in Island Park, ID that are within 30 mins of the entrance of the park AND have lvl 2 chargers.

I'm assuming that would be enough for us to feel pretty confident in the trip.

If you happen to go to the mammoth hot springs area, there are two L2 chargers at the hotel, and one other at the parking of a center that I really can’t recall what it is, but it would be on the right side of the road if traveling east towards the Lamar valley. It’s a clipper creek charger.
Also, thanks to someone’s recommendation in this forum I went to dinner (and then lunch) at Wonderland cafe in Gardiner, and it was awesome! Well worth the 5 mile drive from the hot springs area. Enjoy your trip!

 

[teartags]

Their email addresses are listed directly on that page. I never found a centralized inbox.

I wrote to them as a group, but maybe sending to them as individuals would have more impact?

Oh geez. Yep, the individual emails are all right there. I was looking all around for a "general" email. Sorry

 

[BigSkies]

Oh geez. Yep, the individual emails are all right there. I was looking all around for a "general" email. Sorry

Thank you for contributing!

I've always believed these types of individual write-in campaigns have a decent probability of success.

Most people know who their Congressperson and Senators are.

How many people even know who their state reps are, much less write to them? How many people write into state tourism commissions outside of industry reps?

A small number of people proactively communicating with obscure officials shows a level of commitment that can move the needle on small policy items.

 

[RalphF]

Traveled from Boston to Yellowstone last year. Stayed at three of the lodges in the park, Mammoth Hot Springs, Old Faithful, Lake Yellowstone. Each of the lodges had L2 chargers available free of charge, NPS did not charge to recharge your vehicle. Never had to wait for a charger, was able to start each day with a full charge if needed.

Jackson also has some L3 charges available if you head that way.

We also found a charger at the Chevy dealer in Riverton WY (thank you Plug Share!) on the way to the park from Rawlins WY.

Traveling to and thru Yellowstone with our Rivian was a breeze. Enjoy your trip!

 

[Redline]

Traveled from Boston to Yellowstone last year. Stayed at three of the lodges in the park, Mammoth Hot Springs, Old Faithful, Lake Yellowstone. Each of the lodges had L2 chargers available free of charge, NPS did not charge to recharge your vehicle. Never had to wait for a charger, was able to start each day with a full charge if needed.

Jackson also has some L3 charges available if you head that way.

We also found a charger at the Chevy dealer in Riverton WY (thank you Plug Share!) on the way to the park from Rawlins WY.

Traveling to and thru Yellowstone with our Rivian was a breeze. Enjoy your trip!

I won't need it, as we have a charger in the Airbnb in Driggs, but the lvl 3 in Jackson is sadly not open to Rivian.

 

[RalphF]

My bad, I meant that the Jackson Public Parking garage at 165 S Millward St had several Chargepoint chargers for use. Tesla chargers were not an option.

 

[Joules Burn]

There two 50kW DC ChargePoint chargers in the City garage that are free - courtesy of the local merchants - and are available as long as a Tesla is not using it for prefered parking. Stroll a few blocks into town for a meal and brew and then go look for Moose and BigHorns.

 

[R1Skol]

An update to anyone who cares lol...

The only hotel that really has decent lvl 2 charging in Bismark is a dumpy Days Inn, so I might just have to use the SC in Bismark instead of overnight charging.

we've stayed at Roosevelt place (best western) in Bismarck. It's 6.6kwh front desk has the key to enable box. https://www.plugshare.com/location/167408
Also there is a free 62kw chargepoint at the Mandan Hyundai as well. I hope to do the same trip from MN as well in the future.

 

[jfoonly]

I'm here now, thanks for the comments here. Jackson parking has 1 L2 and 2 L3, advertising 62 and 50 kW but I only got 31 out of the 62. Currently free. Fall river elec coop has stations controlled by rionadi in Driggs, Ashton, Island park. I managed to get thru the klunky website and charge in driggs last week. But today the website is completely down. FR was nice on the phone, got in touch with rionadi, and called back with several updates but no joy. Managed to make it to the RAN in Gardiner with good driving weather using 50% of my max pack or 70kwh (66 to 16%). Saw 2 other Rivians in this corner of the park.

 

[risingphoenix]

I stayed in Jackson recently and scheduled a night at the (expensive but very nice) Hotel Jackson. The valet will charge your car using their Tesla destination chargers as long as you have an adapter.

 

[Redline]

Almost back from our trip. I’ll post up pics and details when I’m back home an settled.


I will say this, the trip was an absolute breeze. Anyone nervous about using an EV or a Rivian in or around the parks should feel confident doing it. Key was the lvl 2 charging at our Airbnb’s. The efficiency in and around the park was amazing…driving across North Dakota…not so much. Never even remotely needed to think about charging inside the park.

Also Gen 1 highway assist is almost more annoying than anything.

 

[teartags]

Thank you for contributing!

I've always believed these types of individual write-in campaigns have a decent probability of success.

Most people know who their Congressperson and Senators are.

How many people even know who their state reps are, much less write to them? How many people write into state tourism commissions outside of industry reps?

A small number of people proactively communicating with obscure officials shows a level of commitment that can move the needle on small policy items.

I wound up writing all of them and got a reply from John Johnson telling me that they intend to discuss this very topic at their next meeting.

 

[BigSkies]

I wound up writing all of them and got a reply from John Johnson telling me that they intend to discuss this very topic at their next meeting.

That's great news. Thank you!

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