I Drove My 2022 Kia EV6 Wind AWD On A 275-Mile Campus Tour From San Diego To Los Angeles And Back On A Single Charge, Arriving Home With Just 1% Battery And 3 Miles Of Range Remaining

Today, the long-distance road trip has been rewired, quite literally. It’s no longer whether the engine will overheat, it’s whether electrons will last long enough to get you to the driveway without crawling into a Walgreens parking lot with 0% and a prayer. And yet, somewhere between range anxiety and the smooth hum of torque at zero RPM, there’s a new kind of fun: the EV range experiment. Dangerous? Maybe. Thrilling? Absolutely.

That’s exactly what happened when Reddit user Mud_Duck_IX, behind the wheel of a 2022 Kia EV6 Wind AWD with 45,000 miles on the clock, set out from San Diego to tour UCLA and USC with a carload of teenagers. Leaving with a 100% state of charge and a casual plan, the trip quickly became less of a simple outing and more of a rolling test in energy management, terrain awareness, and faith in the guess-o-meter. The Redditor wrote:

“Road trip yesterday to take a kid and their three friends to tour the campuses of UCLA and USC from San Diego. Left the house at 100%, drove 75/80MPH when we could, but there was a lot of stop-and-go when in the LA area. Couldn't find a charger at UCLA (I know they have them, but we were tight on time, and searching for them in the parking garage wasn't in the cards). We did find one at USC for the afternoon tour. It was a shared ChargePoint charger and only got 3.1 KW, so we charged for 3 hours during the tour.

We got in the car to leave USC, and the guess-o-meter said we were going to be five miles short of the Google Maps distance back to San Diego, which I took as a personal challenge. We were helped out with LA traffic, and after the first hour had built an 8-mile buffer in the right direction! That said had to slow down to 70MPH and eventually 65MPH as we started hitting the hills north of Encinitas and through Del Mar. Buffer got down to 1 mile with 25 miles to go, but we were at 4 miles on the G-O-M when we got off the freeway with 1.5 miles to go and pulled into the driveway with 3 miles left and 1%.

Made for an interesting drive, and had I not been very familiar with the drive (specifically the elevation changes), we could have been forced to stop and charge 15 minutes from getting home, which would have sucked. But, all's well that ends well :)

Total Miles: 275.27, ended up getting 9.1kw at the trickle charger.

Edit: 2022 Wind w/tech, 45K miles on it.”

The EV6 acquitted itself admirably, carving through the worst of LA’s traffic and terrain without once blinking. What it is, though, is a snapshot of EV life today, where infrastructure, planning, and instinct collide. With no time to scout chargers at UCLA and only a trickle of 3.1 kW at a shared ChargePoint unit at USC, the vehicle sat tethered for three hours during the campus tour. That leisurely charge offered just enough juice to tempt a return trip without a detour. Most would have topped off elsewhere. This driver took it as a challenge.

As the range flirted with reality, the return drive became a masterclass in energy strategy. Early on, LA’s congestion helped extend the buffer. Later, the terrain worked against them. The hills near Encinitas and Del Mar siphoned away that slim margin as surely as an open throttle. At 70 mph, and eventually 65, the EV6 eked out enough efficiency to glide into the driveway with just 1% battery and 3 miles of predicted range left. That kind of arrival is a quiet triumph. No fanfare, no flaming burnout, just the quiet click of a charging cable being plugged in and a glance back at the digital dash that reads “1%.”

This sort of experience is becoming a shared rite of passage among EV drivers. Another Redditor, steelblade2, chimed in with a tale from the Midwest: A trip from Chicago to Ann Arbor, relying on A Better Routeplanner’s prediction of arriving with 10% battery. Then, a surprise dinner pickup added six miles, and suddenly the calculated buffer evaporated. With a few well-timed speed reductions, they made it back with 7 miles and 2% remaining. No panic, just the calm application of EV logic. Speed kills range, but patience buys miles.

Kia EV6: Key Features 

• One of the standout features is its ultra-fast DC charging capability: it can go from about 10 % to 80 % charge in roughly 20 minutes using an 800-volt ultra-fast charger. 
• The EV6 supports a versatile charging ecosystem: Kia Charge Pass gives access to over 35,000 DC fast chargers in North America, including more than 25,000 Tesla Superchargers (with the appropriate adapter). 
• Beyond charging, it has intelligent features like a driver-side charging port placement for convenience, multi-motor all-wheel-drive versions with heat-pump technology for better cold-weather range, and even a flat-floor interior thanks to its EV architecture – enhancing comfort and usability. 
• On the design and technology front, it impresses: there’s a performance-leaning GT-Line AWD variant offering up to 446 lb-ft of torque, heated/ventilated seats including rear outboard seats, a premium 14-speaker Meridian audio system, and a configurable interior that blends sportiness with daily practicality.

These stories highlight more than just clever driving. They spotlight the still-maturing state of EV infrastructure. According to another commenter, Alternative_Ad9806, the closest DC fast charger to UCLA would’ve been at Fox Hills Mall near the 405. But that’s academic when you’re juggling four teenagers and two campus tours. As Mud_Duck_IX replied, “I was honestly hoping to just grab level 2 charging… if I could have done that at both schools, I would have had plenty of buffer.” Instead, they rolled the dice.

The guess-o-meter, or GOM, is the digital compass all EV drivers learn to interpret with suspicion and hope. Like a blackjack dealer who occasionally slips you a win, the GOM is as much gut feel as math. It accounts for terrain, recent driving behavior, and climate conditions, but it can’t predict whether the next 20 miles are a downhill coast or an uphill battle. In this case, it danced between despair and deliverance as the buffer shrank to one mile with 25 left to go. This is not a bug. This is the game.

Yet for all the tension, this wasn’t a tale of desperation. It was one of competence and understanding. The EV6 was up to the task. The driver knew the route. The terrain was familiar. And in the end, the car rolled home without drama, delivering 275.27 miles on a single charge. That’s proof not just of the car’s capability, but of the new skill set modern EV drivers must develop: awareness, restraint, and the ability to trust both machine and instinct.

This is what EV road tripping looks like in the real world. It’s not the sterile perfection of manufacturer estimates. It’s not the dystopia of running out of charge in the desert. It’s something else entirely. A game, a gamble, and ultimately a reward for those willing to engage with the machine and the math.

Image Sources: Kia Media Center

Noah Washington is an automotive journalist based in Atlanta, Georgia. He enjoys covering the latest news in the automotive industry and conducting reviews on the latest cars. He has been in the automotive industry since 15 years old and has been featured in prominent automotive news sites. You can reach him on X and LinkedIn for tips and to follow his automotive coverage.