At the Palé Hall hotel near Bala in Gwynedd there are six chargers, two Porsche destination chargers and four BP Pulse 7kW AC chargers. So far, so nothing out of the ordinary. But Palé Hall has its own micro generation capacity, not from solar PV but hydro. In the 1920s a DC turbine was installed, fed by a stream that runs down the mountain. The current owners rewired the hotel for AC in 2015, and installed a more efficient turbine that has the capacity to power the hotel and the chargers. If you stop in there for a snack, they'll lend you a card to start your charge for free, with the cleanest possible energy your vehicle can receive.
I don't need much of an excuse for a day out, so I fully charged the SR/S overnight in readiness for a 200+ mile loop through Wales, with lunch at Palé Hall.
From Telford the route heads out through Much Wenlock and along Wenlock Edge to Church Stretton. Then there's the run up the steep Burway onto the Long Mynd, where the SR/S was consuming 300Wh/mile at 20mph.
Dropping down off the Long Mynd on a 25% gradient with the most fantastic views, the lack of a gearbox to park on a steep slope meant I couldn't stop for a photo.
Next up was the flowing road to Church Stoke, then Montgomery and Llanfair Caereinion. I wanted to bimble around Lake Vyrnwy, so followed the brown road signs through Llanfyllin and up to the dam.
Following the south shore of the lake to Rhiwargor the single track road climbs out of the valley and enters the Snowdonia national park.
It then descends towards Bala, with more great views.
Before getting to Bala I turned right to Palé Hall, which doesn't disappoint with the approach along the driveway.
While I snacked in the Huntsman bar, the SR/S charged back up on clean, free hydro power.
After lunch it was time for a change of road type. The A494 from Bala to Dolgellau is wide, fast and sweeping with a backdrop of wooded hills. I cut through Brithdir to the Machynlleth road, skirting along the foot of Cadair Idris.
I was headed for Llyn Clywedog where there's a scenic single track road alongside the lake and through the Hafren forest.
Finally at Llanidloes I started to head for home, up the A470 to Newtown then winding my way to Church Stoke, and a short blast on the A49 to Church Stretton. From there I was retracing my steps back to Much Wenlock and Telford. All in all a pretty awesome day out, with a wide variety of roads and fantastic scenery.