Alright, the last few weeks since Ola launch, I forgot to enjoy things I already have. Call it a band wagon effect. Anyway, this weekend, coming up another long leisure ride from Bombay to Matheran and back.
The Ather grid in Kalyan will come handy. Keeping fingers crossed. Will check the following during the journey:
10.1.6 : One of the most stable update for sure. Will be interesting to see how things (map) work
experience the new Ather Go in Kalyan
check out & use the new Ather grid in Kalyan
win wife’s confidence on EVs (yes, she is joining me this time)
time the entire journey.
Will keep sharing the updates & pics here.
True, I think I have 2 options. I might take the one via Thane. The roads there are better but the route is slightly longer. And I can stop to charge at FC in Thane which also has no detour.
Alright, just reached Ather Go, Kalyan.
Total distance travelled: 60 kms
Time to charge here: 30 mins to get back to 52 kms range (enough to reach Matheran). But will charge till 11 am as waiting for KFC to open.
Next stop: Hotel in Neral
Total distance to travel: 35 kms
Total time taken to reach here: ~2 hrs
Few pics:
Good Job Ather team with much needed improvements on navigation … although it still struggles randomly but the thing bounces back like an old man. I didn’t have to stop and enter the address again. But, man I had to be patient.
Few more instances of maps going dead… !! Still an improvement from what we have experienced which was much worse. Atleast, post 10.1.6, the map don’t die often. But, man… I think we have to live with this forever now. After sometime, we are so annoyed that it doesn’t matter anymore. 10 kms & still the map didn’t come back until I stopped, rebooted. Duh…!
Nice writeup and couple bro, I see that u are from Virar, good to see owners from Vasai-Virar region, I stay in Vasai and ur trip has definitely put some confidence in this scooter, will plan to catch up sometime.
So did u use Ride mode for the entire trip and what was the speed u maintained?
I was in ride mode all the time. Average speed could have been easily around ~30-35 kms/hr. Relatively, I was surely going faster than most of the scooters on the road. The FC on the route solves all the range anxiety. Additionally, we left Toothless to charge at a farm house just at the base of Matheran. We returned the next day & we were ready to get back home.
So how I felt about the below points during my leisure ride to Matheran:
*** 10.1.6 :**
Absolutely, not a single dashboard restart noticed.
Map was mostly spot on. It didn’t raise my blood pressure. It went off 4 times but came back twice on its own in a min or 2.
Had to restart the thing 2 times as the map just didn’t want to come back.
compare to my experience while my ride to Pune, this was sooo much better
*** experience the new Ather Go in Kalyan**:
the staff was super supportive & enthusiastic
even they have raised issues with Ather grid status in the app.
they agreed that the app needs 1 more status (like blue when the charger is in use. Grey is simply confusing)
had a nice discussion on Ather vs Ola. We concluded that software experience is the key.
*** Total time taken** (Bombay - Matheran): ~4 hrs
Virar to Kalyan: 1.5 hrs (60 kms)
FC stop: 30-40 mins to get back to 60 kms range (enjoyed food at KFC while Toothless was getting charged)
Kalyan to Matheran’s base: 1.5 hrs
We took our own sweet time while coming back. Sight seeing, eating & shopping.
Overall rating: 8/10
8 because, if the range was 120-130 kms, we could have easily taken Toothless right to the top at the Matheran Parking space. The ride in the ghats could have been heavenly & we could have saved rs. 700 on ride sharing.
@tarun@abhishek.balaji
Nope… I would charge at Thane and due to the incline I end up with very low charge 2 kms away from the base. From there, we take a rickshaw and then a cab to the top. If we get a new fast charger near the base, we can then ride it all the way to the top. That will be fun…!
There’s supposed to be a fast charger at Hotel Om Navratna (Found an image of the fast charger on Google Maps to confirm) currently not operational.
And it shows 30km from there to the top
That charger is way off the route IMO. The best way is through Kalyan. But Ather removed the charger in Kalyan. I took that route the first time I went to Matheran. The second time, I had to take Thane route and it wasn’t fun.
Next stop: Hotel in Neral
Total distance to travel: 35 kms
Total time taken to reach here: ~2 hrs
Few pics:
10 kms & still the map didn’t come back until I stopped, rebooted. Duh…!
