In this video my girlfriend and I head out on the road for a one-day micro road trip to the desert wastelands on the north side of Utah’s Great Salt Lake. We visit the Spiral Jetty, Golden Spike National Historic Site, the Thiokol/ATK Rocket Garden, and Crystal Hot Springs.
(Click here if you can’t see the video embedded below.)
I just put the finishing touches on a downloadable/printable journal for SUV RVing, vandwelling, overlanding, road tripping, etc. It’s free and you can download it below.
The idea is that you download the PDF, print the necessary quantities of
the pages you need, punch holes in them, and stick them in a three-ring
binder. Take the binder with you on your trips and jot down the relevant information as desired.
After each page in the journal is an example page with red text that will help you better understand what each field is for. These pages do not need to be printed.
The printable pages in the journal include:
Again, you just need to print out the pages you’re interested in.
In addition to the pages in the journal, I also recommend printing a single-page year-at-a-glance calendar here.
**Click here to view/download the journal (PDF; 170 kB).**
This video (also embedded below) goes into a bit more detail about the journal and shows you how I’ve got mine arranged in a binder along with tabbed dividers, etc.
I always travel solo on my SUV RVing adventures, and I use the REI Camp Bed 3.5 Self-Inflating Sleeping Pad as a mattress. Because I only camp alone, the need for a 2-person mattress to fit into the back of my SUV never came up, but I was recently reminded of them when reading an article on Adventure Journal that introduced me to the Klymit Insulated Double V Sleeping Pad, which retails for $160ish:
It’s 47 inches wide. The narrowest portion of the rear area of my SUV (the spot between the two wheel wells) is 44 inches, but I think the mattress would fit just fine with a little bit of bunching on the sides. Because I have what is probably one of the smallest SUVs out there (a RAV4), my guess is that this and other two-person mattresses would fit in most larger SUVs.
I was vaguely aware that 2-person sleeping pads or camp mattresses existed, but I decided to dive deeper into the realm and see what other offerings I could find on the market for those of you who do travel with a significant other. These pads/mattresses are listed from narrowest to widest.
And then there’s the Wolfwill SUV Air Bed, which can adjust to fit a variety of sizes.
Of course the other option here is to simply get two single camping mattresses and put them next to each other.
One other thing to keep in mind when buying any camping mattress or sleeping pad is the amount of insulation it will provide. A mattress that’s full of air and nothing else will not insulate as well as a foam mattress, for example. Some pads are hybrids that inflate but also have layers of closed cell foam in them. How well a pad can insulate is conveyed in its R-value, which is stated on the pages above for many of the mattresses. If you camp a lot in cooler temperatures, the R-value is definitely something to look at.
Note: Some of these links are Amazon affiliate links.
In this week’s video I go over how I do laundry when I’m on the road. Be sure to watch all the way to the end of the video to catch a bonus clip.
(Click here if you can’t see the video below.)
In this video I go over my expenses from my recent month-long road trip I just got back from. I cover vehicle costs, food costs, gas expenses, and other expenses.
(Click here if you can’t see the video below.)
For a couple of years now I’ve used sewn rectangles of no-see-um netting and individually wrapped magnets to keep bugs out of my SUV when camping with the windows rolled down. Here’s the latest iteration of the setup in action:
I made an entire video about the setup here, and I explain in the video how you can easily make your own set by using small magnets and duct tape.
If you don’t want to make your own, or if you want something that’s more finished and longer-lasting than the duct tape, I have something for you. I recently discovered a much better and more durable way to encase the magnets, and that is to use a heavy duty nylon fabric that seals onto itself. This creates a tough, waterproof sleeve/housing for the magnets. I’d like to offer these magnetic window screen kits for sale, and I have two of these kits currently for sale to gauge interest. EDIT: Both sets have been sold.
Each kit includes the following:
Here’s what you’ll be getting with each kit:
And you can view and download the instructions (PDF) by clicking the image below:
I currently have two of these kits for sale. I made just a couple to see if there is enough interest in them to warrant investing in more tools and materials. If so, I’ll make more in the future. I’m selling each set (enough for two windows) for $35, including shipping to anywhere in the lower 48. Final pricing once I make more will be $45 or $50. The reason for the discount? Twofold: 1) I want to quickly gauge if there’s any interest here, and 2) there are some cosmetic blemishes on some of the magnets and the screens (as seen in the images above) that in no way affect their usability.
Interested? Contact me here using the contact form and let me know. I’ll then send you a PayPal request for $35, and you’ll be able to pay with a either a PayPal account or a credit card, but I won’t be able to see or have access to your credit card information (that’s how PayPal works).
Thanks!
Tristan
In this final video from my four-state, two-country road trip, I leave Death Valley and make the trek eastward toward my adopted high-elevation homeland of Utah. Along the way I check out some historical sites in Death Valley, a ghost town in Nevada, an incredible crater out in the middle of Nevada called Lunar Crater, and more! (Click here if you can’t see the video below.)
And here are some pics from the day’s adventures:
In an older video, I shared a quick and easy way to setup an awning on the side of you vehicle, but today’s video shows my preferred method. It’s faster to set up and more secure than the clamp method.
(If you can’t see the video below, click here.)
The tarp that I use in the awning is this one that I got from Walmart (and other colors are now available online too). I’ve seen them at many Walmarts in the camping section.
In this video I embark on a 33-mile day hike in Death Valley National Park. Touted as Death Valley’s “premier backpacking route,” the Cottonwood-Marble Canyon Loop takes in slot canyons, petroglyphs, natural springs, wild horses, wide-open valleys, and more.
If you’re interested in finding out more about this hike, this (scroll down to the Cottonwood-Marble Canyon Loop section) and this (a PDF) are good places to start.
This is another vlog in my series from January and February 2017. I left northern Utah, where I live, and traveled down through southern Utah, southern Nevada, western Arizona, southern California, and back through central Nevada, all while camping and adventuring out of my 2011 Toyota RAV4.
(Click here if you can’t see the video below.)
And here are some pics from the adventure:
Here are a bunch of SUV RVing-related things that readers and viewers shared with me this week. Thanks guys!
Got something else that you think the SUV RVing community might find useful? Shoot me an email and let me know about it.
One video watcher and book reader (hi Linda!) passed along a website for finding campgrounds. It’s called Hipcamp. It’s along the same lines as Campendium and FreeCampsites.net but doesn’t appear quite as good as either of those for finding free places to camp. I browsed some of the areas that I’m familiar with and found that it only has established paid campgrounds. Sometimes that’s exactly what you want, so this is a good website to know about and to add to your arsenal. Check it out and tell me what you think.
A new email subscriber to the blog (hi Gennaro!) recommended a few apps that he’s found useful on his road trip adventures (all are free except Goodreader, which is $4.99):
Video watcher and fellow YouTuber Florida Girl Adventures has an FJ Cruiser and came up with a clever way of hanging up curtains in her SUV. She attached the hook side of a Velcro strip to blackout curtains and found that the Velcro stuck to the headliner on the inside of her vehicle. See the setup in action in this video (the curtain part starts at about 2 minutes and 17 seconds in).
And finally, another reader/viewer (hi Richard!) sent me a link to an interesting product on Amazon. It’s the Cleanwaste Go Anywhere Portable Toilet, and Richard pointed out that it could be used as a small table when not being used as a toilet. In a space as small as an SUV, it’s always good when items are multi-use. The Reliance Products Fold-To-Go Portable Toilet is in the same vein.
(Note: This blog post contains Amazon affiliate links.)
