Bengaluru to Tirupati

 The most difficult part of planning a trip to Tirupati is getting the Darshan tickets and the easiest part is to plan EV charging.

 Thankfully we were able to resolve the most difficult part and got Darshan tickets for Saturday 4PM. We left home Friday at 5PM and stopped at Nandi food plaza, Chittor for dinner at around 9PM. We dint really need to charge plus there was a Nexon already charging there. So we just finished dinner and reached Tirupati at 10:20PM with 30% SoC left, thanks to the elevation loss from Bangalore to Tirupati.

There are plenty of charging options at Tirupati. Since we staying overnight i chose to charge at the 7kW slow charger at Taj Tirupati. I had booked a room at service apartment next to Hotel bliss. The plan was to use DC charger at Bliss or Bhimas as backup if Taj wasn't available. But the AC charger at Taj worked like a charm and started in one go. I left the car for overnight charge and took a 20 minute walk to our service apartment. Then did a 20 minute walk in the morning and picked up the car at 7:30AM with 100% SoC. The staff were very helpful and said i could leave the car for even 24hrs without a worry. There weren't many other cars seeking this charger. We visited in Tirupati all morning and started to Tirumala at 12:30.

30kW DC Fast chargers by Tata at Taj Tirupati

Two 7kW slow chargers by Tata at Taj Tirupati

The drive uphill, as expected, was quite draining and i spent 15% SoC for the 26km drive. The drive back down after Darshan though was less rewarding that I had expected. I only gained 2% SoC while using Eco and Regen 3

The rest of the way to Bangalore was a smooth drive with good roads and very little traffic. On both ways I was able to use cruise control comfortably for long stretches. Which I think was a huge contributor to good efficiency. On the return journey, we did a dinner stop again at Nandi food plaza and also did a top up. Both the food and charging was a mix bag experience. Dosa was no better than napkin in texture and was cold, we complained and they dint charge us. So that was free. Charger had error code 400A, it took a couple of tries and releasing emergency button to start charging. Then it again did not stop through app and had to press the emergency, so charging was free too. Backup charger to Nandi plaza was Zeon 50kW at Aaradhya grand, Kolar. They close at 11pm though, so need to plan accordingly.