fred laid this down on his screen :
They should have planned a re-charge before their battery was too depleted,
even if this meant stopping on the way up.

As I read it, that is what they did.
I regularly do a trip which
exceeds my battery capacity. I have located a charge point 75%of the journey
on the out leg. At my destination I again have access to a choice of charge
points which means if my first choice on the way up isn't available I can
still manage the first leg of my journey. If all these choices are
unavailable I can head for a near big city where there are multiple choices.

So you set off with a plan A, B and C, where C involves extra miles out
of your way. It seems a bit extreme to me, that I would need so many
backup plans for every longer trip I decided to make. Seems more like a
campaign, than a simple trip.