Following a bit of a delay, the all-new Ford Explorer EV is set to launch in Europe this coming August, though a pre-production prototype has been busy driving around the world with travel adventure influencer Lexie Alford – or Lexie Limitless – behind the wheel for months now. That journey began back in September and Alford officially completed the European leg of this long journey before traversing Africa in late October as she attempts to become the first person to circumnavigate the globe in an electric vehicle. That portion of the trip was completed largely trouble-free, and wrapped up a little over a month ago, setting the stage for a journey through Asia in December. Now, Alford and her Ford Explorer EV have successful traversed South America, too.
This particular leg of the journey once again presented Alford and her Ford Explorer EV with more unique terrain and weather conditions as the two headed into the Atacama Desert in Chile – which is the driest non-polar desert on the planet and has served as an experimentation site for Mars expedition simulations due to its similarities with the Martian environment.
From there, charging infrastructure once again proved to be the biggest problem with this long road trip as Alford headed through the mountains on her way to La Serena, though the Explorer EV’s regenerative braking helped restore a bit of power on the decent. This once again became an issue in Taltal, where the only available charger would have taken as much as 66 hours to fill up the EV, so Alford switched to a different route with better infrastructure. Ultimately, the duo wound up making it with no problem, and are now looking ahead to the next part of this journey.
Alford’s epic road trip will ultimately see her cross a total of 30 countries before it’s all said and done. The reason for the journey centers around the roughly 100 year anniversary of Aloha Wanderwell’s historic trip, one that saw her become the first woman to drive around the world, crossing through 43 countries across a five-year period in a Model T.
We’ll have more on the new Ford Explorer EV and Lexie Alford soon, so be sure to subscribe to Ford Authority for more Ford Explorer news and around-the-clock Ford news coverage.
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