It was late 2017, and I had started thinking about what came next on my side of the garage.
I absolutely loved my 2015 Chevrolet Spark EV. It was the perfect around-town companion. Cheap to operate, surprisingly fun to drive, and perfectly suited to life on the Oregon Coast, it had become one of my favorite vehicles I had ever owned. The problem wasn’t the car itself. The problem was that I had completely fallen in love with the EV lifestyle.
The Spark’s roughly 70-mile real-world range effectively limited me to Tillamook County. In the two years I owned it, the farthest it had ever traveled from home was Warrenton, about 60 miles away. Ironically, the only reason it ever made that trip was for a recall. Since my particular Spark didn’t have the optional CCS fast charging port and only had a 3.3 kW onboard charger, I couldn’t exactly wait around for it to charge. Instead, I dropped it off at the dealer, accepted a Silverado loaner, drove home, and returned the following day. Before leaving, I specifically instructed the service department to make sure the Spark was fully charged before I came back.
That was EV ownership in 2017.
Still, I loved it.
The problem was that by then I had experienced enough electric driving to know I wanted more. More range, more flexibility, and the ability to leave the Oregon Coast without carefully planning every mile.
Fortunately, 2017 was a significant year for the EV market. For the first time, there were affordable EVs that weren’t simply compliance cars. Chevrolet had introduced the Bolt EV with a rated range of 238 miles. Tesla had begun shipping the Model 3, although most of the examples you could actually buy at that point were still fairly expensive. Having already owned both a Volt and a Spark EV, the Bolt felt like the natural next step in my personal EV journey.
I had started noticing some surprisingly attractive lease specials on the Bolt. They were nowhere near as absurd as the $99-per-month deal I had scored on the Spark, but they were dramatically better than the roughly $400-per-month lease I had carried on my Volt years earlier. One ad in particular caught my attention. Wentworth Chevrolet—the same dealership that had leased me the Spark—was advertising Bolt EV leases for around $275 per month.
That was all the encouragement I needed.
For the next couple of weeks, I launched what could best be described as a persistent lobbying campaign aimed at my wife. I explained why the Bolt made sense. I explained why the additional range would be useful. I explained why leasing was still a good idea. Most importantly, I explained why I absolutely needed one.
Eventually, after enduring a sufficient amount of automotive badgering, Courtney relented.
With permission secured, I reached out to my salesman, Cleo, who had originally leased me the Spark. Cleo worked some serious magic. Between a Costco member discount, a loyalty incentive from Chevrolet, and a few other promotions, he managed to put together a deal that was significantly better than I expected. Chevrolet even agreed to pull ahead the final six months of my Spark lease, allowing me to get out of it early without penalty.
When all the dust settled, my Bolt payment came in at $228 per month.
That was more than double what I was paying for the Spark, but it was also a vastly more capable vehicle.
There was just one problem.
I still had to get to Portland to pick it up.
And I had to do it in a Spark EV.
If you recall from my Spark article, I had made it home from the dealership the day I leased the car with about nine miles of range remaining. But that had been two and a half years earlier on a brand-new battery. Since then, the battery had experienced some degradation, we had moved from Tillamook to Netarts—which added another seven miles or so to the journey—and it was now November instead of spring. The colder weather wasn’t going to do me any favors.
All signs pointed to this being a much more challenging trip.
Courtney wisely elected not to join me on this particular adventure, which was probably for the best. I set off from the coast with a mixture of excitement and mild anxiety, knowing that if my calculations were wrong, I might be spending a lot more time on the side of Highway 6 than I wanted.
To conserve as much energy as possible, I drove over the Coast Range at roughly 45 miles per hour, pulling over frequently to let traffic pass. I used the heater only when absolutely necessary to keep the windshield defrosted.
Eventually I made it to Banks, where there was a Level 2 charger. I plugged the Spark in and settled in for an hour-long charging session. During that time, I sat inside the local Subway shivering. I was so cold that I didn’t even drink my soda, which is really saying something because I love soda.
The goal wasn’t to fully recharge the car. I just wanted enough energy that I could drive the rest of the way at normal highway speeds instead of continuing my rolling roadblock impression over the Coast Range.
Once I had enough charge, I got back on the road. This was actually only the second time I had driven the Spark any significant distance on the highway, and at speed it was a surprisingly fun little car. Light, zippy, and eager, it felt much happier cruising through Portland traffic than crawling over mountain passes at 45 miles per hour.
Eventually I pulled into Wentworth Chevrolet with about ten miles of range remaining.
I had genuinely loved my time with the Spark. It had been an incredible little car and one of the best automotive bargains I’d ever stumbled into. But after that drive, I was more than ready to move into something with real range.
The Bolt I selected was a fairly basic LT model equipped with the Comfort and Convenience Package. That package added heated front seats and an auto-dimming rearview mirror. This time, however, I made sure to get the optional CCS fast-charging package. After living with the Spark for two and a half years, I knew I wasn’t going to buy another EV without DC fast charging.
Otherwise, I was perfectly happy with the base model. I didn’t need leather seats, fancy trim packages, or every available option. The LT had everything I actually needed, and that was enough.
The feature I was most excited about wasn’t the equipment list anyway. It was the color. On Chevrolet’s website, Kinetic Blue looked pretty good. In person, it was stunning. It was bright, vibrant, and impossible to lose in a parking lot. Shortly after I brought the car home, my friend Tyler suggested it should be named “The Blueberry” in honor of Gus and Shawn’s Toyota Yaris from Psych. The name stuck immediately.
The buying process itself was once again a pleasure. Cleo took great care of me, and Wentworth Chevrolet continued to reinforce why I kept coming back. They really knew how to treat their customers. I’m genuinely sad that dealership no longer exists. The Wentworth family eventually sold the business, and today the location is a Subaru dealership.
As I settled into the driver’s seat and looked at the dashboard for the first time, the number that immediately grabbed my attention wasn’t the speedometer.
It was the range estimate.
There it was. 243 miles. Coming from a Spark EV that required strategic planning to travel beyond Tillamook County, it almost felt unreal. Naturally, I decided to put that range to work immediately.
Instead of simply driving home, I pointed the Bolt toward McMinnville, where Roby’s had recently opened a new store and needed some computer work done. After all, if I was going to lease another car, I needed to help pay for it somehow.
The Bolt was phenomenal. Everything I loved about the Spark was still there, but it was bigger, more refined, and dramatically more capable. The center display was huge for the time, fast and responsive, and included Apple CarPlay. The acceleration wasn’t quite as outrageous as the hilariously torque-heavy Spark EV, but passing slower traffic still required little more than flexing my right ankle.
The seats deserve special mention as well. Bolt seats are surprisingly controversial among owners. Some people absolutely hate them. For whatever reason, they fit me perfectly. My back can be extremely picky about seats, but I never had a single complaint during my entire time with the car.
By the end of the day, I had driven from Portland to McMinnville, spent time working at the new Roby’s location, and then driven home to the Oregon Coast. The entire trip was 116 miles.
I pulled into my driveway with exactly half the battery remaining. More importantly, I had used the climate control the entire time. The heater was on. The heated seats were on. I wasn’t hypermiling. I wasn’t driving 45 miles per hour. I wasn’t sitting shivering in a Subway waiting for a Level 2 charger. For the first time, I felt like I had an electric car that didn’t require any compromises.
Oh yeah. I was going to like big-boy EV life.
The Bolt settled into the rhythm of our life perfectly. Suddenly, whenever we were leaving town, we had a choice: Bolt or Escape. If it hadn’t been for the mileage limits on the lease, the answer would have almost always been the Bolt. The Escape was a perfectly good vehicle, but the Bolt was simply more enjoyable. It was quieter, smoother, quicker, and dramatically cheaper to operate.
The range changed everything. During the summer, the Bolt could make it from Netarts to Courtney’s parents’ house in Damascus and back on a single charge. In the winter, I usually stopped at a CCS charger for ten minutes or so on the way home, more for peace of mind than necessity. The car probably could have made it without charging, but I never enjoyed living on the edge quite that much.
Central Oregon was equally easy. A quick ten- or fifteen-minute charging stop in Salem provided a comfortable buffer on the trip over. Coming home was even easier. Since you were descending most of the way back toward the coast, the Bolt would regenerate enough energy that I could often make it home without stopping at all. It felt almost magical.
For the first time, I had an EV that didn’t require careful planning or compromises. The charging stops were short, infrequent, and generally happened at places where I wanted to stretch my legs anyway. Looking back, I think that’s when I truly stopped thinking of electric cars as an alternative to gasoline cars. The Bolt wasn’t an alternative. For my life, it was simply better.
If I have one regret, it’s that I didn’t select a higher mileage allowance on the lease. I found myself constantly keeping an eye on the odometer because I wanted to drive it everywhere. Every road trip became a math problem involving remaining lease miles, and that slowly started to take some of the fun out of ownership.
Outside of the driveway, things were going well too. At Tillamook School District, my dad retired as Superintendent in 2019 after serving in the role for eighteen years. It felt like the end of an era. For the first time since I had started working for the district as a teenager, my dad wasn’t part of the organization anymore.
My boss still wasn’t ready to retire, however, and I was starting to get restless in my current position. The new superintendent wanted to keep me around, so he created a new role: Assistant Network Manager. The promotion came with a modest pay raise and, perhaps more importantly, a title that looked considerably better on a resume. I appreciated both.
By 2020, I could see the end of the Bolt lease approaching. I still absolutely loved the car, but the mileage limits and constant concern about excess wear and tear had finally started to wear on me, as well as the never ending car payments. After leasing three different vehicles over the years, I was ready to be done with leasing altogether. I wanted a vehicle I could drive as much as I wanted without worrying about penalties waiting for me at turn-in time.
Then COVID happened. The world shut down. People stopped driving. Car sales slowed dramatically. Dealers suddenly found themselves sitting on inventory they couldn’t move.
For someone who enjoyed buying cars, it turned out to be an interesting time. As it happened, I was able to pick up my next vehicle for an absolutely screaming deal.
But we’ll talk about that next week.
Two Bolt stories in one week! Like you, I leased OG electric cars. I had two LEAFS and I understand having to play games to get extended range. 90% of the time, the range was fine for daily needs. My two longest type drives could be made (barely) on a full charge but almost always I could charge at my destination (son’s music lesson or my hair appointment, each of which took an hour.)
I didn’t like the Bolt’s interior (white material around the dash that looked like shelf liner) or seats. Two coworkers were also early adopters. One like you loved his Volt. Once his landlord installed a charging station, he bought a Tesla. The other started with an e-Golf. I didn’t like it because I preferred cars that were only designed to be electric. She then leased a Bolt. Eventually, she also bought a Tesla. I can just imagine having hundreds of miles of range after being used to less than a hundred. Also the Bolt came in fun colors, like that aqua, the tennis ball yellow, a pretty silver blue, and your bright blue.
Right??? I laughed when I opened CC this morning.
Tyler – I like the way you write and, more importantly, your taste in cars. 🙂
It was pretty funny! Both blue, no less!
The sticking point for EVs for me isn’t the range, but rather my home situation. Right now I live in a house with a driveway, though not a garage. But there’s a good chance I’ll need to move to a garden-apartment or condo setup where you have a parking lot nearby but no place to plug in. I’d have to rely on DC fast charging for much refueling. If I knew I was going to live in the same house with the same garage, I’d barely consider a combustion-powered new car. But even if there’s a garage or parking space with a plug, it’s frustrating and expensive to buy and install a new level 2 charger if you have to move frequently.
I’m in a similar position. I’ve done some research, and for me, public level 3 charging costs around 3x what it would cost if I could charge at home, and I’d spend nearly as much per mile as I currently do on gasoline.
I would love and EV because my driving habits are simple: I rarely go on the highway and rarely go father than say 20 km.
The problem is that I live in an older building. There is not enough electrical service available, meaning I’d be forced to use DC fast chargers. We all know what they do to batteries and the cost is often not far from that of gasoline.
It simply makes no sense to replace my Golf with an EV. It is paid for and has 69,000 km on it. I love the car and gasoline isn’t that much of an issue because I don’t drive much. In 2025, I spent C$942 on gasoline, making the payback for an EV would be very long indeed.
la673 and Evan: Don’t know if this will help at all, but here’s a thought coming from someone who was a very early adapter of EV’s. My first was in 2015 and it was an 86 mile range Spark AND I lived in an apartment with no chargers. Plus, in my work at a dealership, I am often assisting new EV buyers with training.
What I tell people is that it really doesn’t matter that much where you live. No houses or apartments have a gas pump at them. But all have electricity. Depending on how many miles you drive per week, having a modern EV is really no different from gas. If you have to stop for gas about once per week, what’s the problem with stopping to charge once per week? Most EV’s now have enough range to make that a reality. When it comes to price, DCFC/Tesla SC is not cheap. However, you can get the apps and have an account that normally gets you discounted pricing. And if you go at times when it’s less busy, the price can be less as well.
Owning/driving an EV isn’t as difficult as many think. In fact, I feel like it’s easier. Hope this helps.
That’s true. EV ownership pencils out the best by far if you can charge at home.
Great reading. I can certainly relate as I have owned (leased) both the Spark EV and owned (financed) several Bolts. I truly loved them all, but you hit the nail on the head about the lack of range on the Spark. It wasn’t a problem till it was.
I now have a 2026 Equinox EV. Base model with zero options. Outside of not liking the door handles (outside ones), I love the car. And it’s that blue!! Not quite the same blue, but boy do I like it. And range???? If I charge to 100%, I’m getting a real 340 miles of range. For the first time ever, I now find myself only charging to 85% and still have just over 300 miles of range.
That’s awesome! I’ve had a flawless experience with GM EVs. I really like the look of the Equinox EV.
My sticking point in 2020 was that the Bolt was a $30,000 car (before discounts) when a Honda Fit started at $16k, so that’s what I bought, going out of my way to get a manual transmission since I didn’t want to waste what would likely be my last gas engine on a CVT.
Now it’s that I don’t plan to replace that car anytime soon, but if I did I’d be looking at Bolts, particularly the post facelift small body. I can L2 charge for free at work so owning a paid for gas car is the only reason not to.
A Fit was another great choice.
The closest we came to all electric was a Ford C-max hybrid. It was a terrific car in all respects. But two years into ownership, we decided to leave the flat land of Florida and move to a ridge in NE Tennessee. When we came to look at the home we bought, our realtor nicely said “you’ll need four wheel drive here. That car won’t do.”
This was repeated by the home inspector and my neighbor. I thought, “naw, it’ll do fine.” Then our first snow. Our driveway sits at a 19 degree incline. That Ford slid down that driveway five times while I was trying to climb. I even pulled just off the road, set the brake and it slid into our ditch! Sadly it did have to go away for a Ram.
Then our son bought a Mach E. He didn’t keep it long at all. He told me that, while he had no proof, climbing up and down these mountains really drained the battery fast. He was charging it 3-4 times weekly and only drove about 5-7 miles to work. So, I don’t see an EV in our future while we live so far up. But I really loved the driving experience of both our C-max and his Mach.
I think winter tires may have helped in that situation more than AWD, although both would be ideal.
To each his own, but I’ll stick with my ICE ’21 Accord Touring 2L turbo: it’s quick, reasonably fuel efficient (lo 30s hwy), roomy, with a GR8 driver’s power 12 way seat! Plus a replacement battery doe$ NOT co$t many thousands of dollars! Of all my 69 cars, it has become my favorite sedan. Also, I have NO driving range concerns!! 🙂 DFO
An Accord is a great choice. But it’s not like gas cars don’t ever need expensive repairs, especially these day. But you’re a lot less likely to need one on a Honda I’d say.
I’m teased by EVs. The Bolt, Ioniq5 and Mach-E are all attractive to me. The first reasonably priced EV that hits the magic 400 mile realistic range will probably get my money.