Tesla was kind enough to offer me a Cybertruck ‘Beast’ for an entire weekend after the company started offering 48-hour test drives of the vehicles across its lineup. I got a call from my local showroom asking if I would like to partake in a weekend of fun with perhaps the coolest truck around, and of course, I said yes.
It was a little different from past weekend Demo Drives in the sense that I picked up the Cybertruck in the morning on Saturday instead of the evening, when the showroom would be closed, and I would have to have it back at open time on Monday. I had my full Saturday with it; I took it for a round of golf, I took it to dinner with my Fiancè and parents, and it truly gave me a full-fledged feel of what it would be like to own one.
There were a lot of things I liked, and there were a handful of things I’d like to change. I’ll go through all of those in this article:
First Impressions
This was the second time I had ever driven Cybertruck, with the first being at early Demo Drives last August when I drove to West Chester, PA.
I picked it up at 10 am on Saturday morning, and the team at Tesla Mechanicsburg had me in and out in less than five minutes. I grabbed my paperwork and was on my way, and I took my best friend with me as he had never been in one. He was never a fan of the Cybertruck’s look, but could not deny the interior’s clean and minimalistic appearance.
This Cyberbeast was in terrific shape. I do wish the inside was vacuumed, the windshield was cleaned, and the wiper fluid reservoir was full, but these were all things I took care of myself after I got home. I would love to know how some Cybertruck owners clean their windshields, as I could get most, but not all. The bottom portion remained a tad smudged-up, but it was nothing unusual.
It was fun to pull into my local diner near my house, and about 45 minutes away from the Mechanicsburg showroom, to see all of the people nearby turn their heads just to get a look at this thing. Of course, I knew it would be soon that I’d get some middle fingers, but for now, it was all friendly. Smiles, waves, and fun. It was genuinely a fun experience.
My Weekend in the Cybertruck
First things first, I had an afternoon tee time with some buddies of mine who did not know that I was getting the Cybertruck for the weekend. They were all surprised to see it, to say the least!
They had never been inside one, and did mention that the interior was just plain awesome. The glass ceiling was among their favorite features of the Cybertruck, but conditioning the cabin to be nice and cool as we finished up on the 18th was awesome too. Their cars do start remotely, but do not feature adjustable climate settings.
This kept me cool on my entire ride home, and is something all Teslas feature. It’s among the best little additions, especially as the Summer months approach.
A reader and follower told me to throw my clubs in the frunk next time. I will do that.
After golf, it was time to pick my Fiancè up from the house and my parents as well, where we drove about an hour to Hampstead, Maryland, for a nice dinner to celebrate my better-half’s graduation from nursing school. My parents were truly blown away by the Model Y a few weekends ago, so this was what I was really looking forward to for them, because their reaction is genuinely so exciting.
My favorite thing about driving this truck was the positive reactions I got from many. I got a lot of waves, a lot of people wanting me to honk the horn, one of my neighbors even said, “Do you mind if I look inside of it?” I showed him all the cool features like the tonneau, the power frunk, and the size of everything.
Of course, I also had a handful of people who made their feelings about the car very apparent with a quick fling of the middle finger toward me as I drove by. I never understood flicking people off over a car: maybe how they drive, or maybe if they have a weird bumper sticker. I wasn’t around any of the middle finger-givers long enough for them to assess my driving, and the Cybertruck was void of any stickers or decals.
Oh well.
Sunday was a lengthy, 300-or-so-mile drive from my house to the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, PA. I try to go twice a year to pay my respects to the heroes, but I also saw it as a good time to test the range, experience Supercharging, see how the Cybertruck handled a longer day, and see how I felt in the car after the drive.
My first Supercharging stop was in Fort Littleton, PA, where v4 Supercharger stalls were placed in what was very obviously a small, rural, and predominantly blue-collar town. It was pretty fun to see a Supercharger in such a rural area. I had great speeds, as you can see, and we topped out at upwards of 330 kW.
It was nice to sit there and feel what charging would be like as opposed to driving a gas car and having a quick stop at a gas station. I’ll be honest: it’s not at all what a gas station experience is like, which is quick, painless, and easy. However, stopping for ~20 minutes to grab some mileage was also a nice break from the drive. It let me take a few minutes to wind down because the weather was awful, and driving in the rain is never super fun.
This was one of two charging stops, the other being in Breezewood, PA, using V3 Superchargers. This was a stop that was more congested than the Fort Littleton charger, but there was much more to offer, like a Dunkin Donuts, a pizza shop, and even a Starbucks down below. It was a quick stop, but the charging experience was very sound. I would say that if you are someone who wants to get from Point A to Point B as fast as possible, the charging experience might not be for you.
I tend to be one of those people, but I didn’t feel like it disrupted my drive or ruined anything. There was plenty to do, and it was 20 minutes maximum before I was back on the road and heading back to my destination, whether it was the Memorial or home.
Why I Didn’t Use Full Self-Driving
I didn’t use Full Self-Driving at all during my weekend with the Cybertruck. There are two reasons for this.
The first is that I know what FSD is capable of. I know it’s great, and I know I love it. This weekend was a very quick one, and my time with the car was limited. I wanted to have as much hands-on experience with the Steer-by-Wire and four-wheel steering as I could. I had an extremely fast and powerful vehicle that was faster than anything I’ve ever had the pleasure of driving. I wanted to have fun with it.
The second was that I genuinely LOVED driving the Cybertruck. I will admit, I think I am one of those people who is not in love with driving, so I was really happy to have a car that made me want to drive.
My Final Thoughts
Share this article so I can afford to buy one. Just kidding (or am I?).
It was genuinely one of my favorite weekends in recent memory. I really loved a lot about the truck. It was fast, it was fun to drive, and it is a high-tech car. It’s never fun going back to my car when I have to drop off whatever Tesla I have for the weekend back at the showroom.
