🤣 Missed opportunity!

I have to police my stuff to keep my cat out. T1.. the terminator. Huge, orange cat. Even if I lock him in my house. Next door neighbor loves him. Food.

I go on a trip and come home.. And there is this big cat.

I assume you've seen my wedge vs full pop-up video from about a month ago, but if not, I'd definitely give that a watch: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/bKdxhtt50bzKYKM.html If at all possible, I would try to get a firsthand look at both and see how each space feels to you. Topo usually has a booth at Expo West, PNW, and Mtn West (and probably other events as well - I'm sure they could tell you where/when). I mean, I'm suuuuper happy with my Mesa, but I've been in the Badlander as well...it's quite an appealing space, though obviously for a good chunk more money. Good luck and keep me posted!

@@softroadingthewest Thanks again.

Haha! I spent a surprising amount of time scouring through my music service's collection trying to find pieces that I felt had the right vibe for this so it makes me happy someone noticed. :-) As it turns out, the video I ended up working on this week had a similar need, so I unexpectedly had a new excuse to use these songs right away, you'll hear them again briefly tomorrow. :-)

@@softroadingthewest very exciting!!! Looking forward to it!

I do this anyways after a long trip with my GFC. Open the top, sides, roof panels and just let it air dry and ventilate.

@@scottymac5174 It isn’t a huge deal. But the winter camping part has gotten me extremely frustrated to the point I finally caved and order the Tuktut. It’s not gonna look as cool, and it’s a good amount heavier, but I do a lot of winter camping so I think it’ll be worth it. If I didn’t winter camp, would definitely be satisfied with the GFC.

@@Chops00 I'm clueless here. What is a Tuktut? Thanks!

I have never heard of a tuktut. I live in an area withy a whole lot of rain, no snow. Seas level

@@scottymac5174 Tuktut is Scout camper’s smallest model. It is a slide in hard sided insulated camper made for 5ft truck beds. 634 lbs. I am in Colorado where it can snow from October-June so my use case is much different lol.

Camping in the driveway saves a lot of gas and wear and tear on your great truck. Plus you have the benefit of the cat inspector to make sure everything goes as planned? Makes me want to add a wedge to my Element! Gracias

Sure, but that's the case for virtually any vehicle-based camping, be it RTT or slide-in camper or van or sleeping in the back of an SUV. Obviously not necessary for a ground tent, though when I was ground tent camping, finding a big enough swath of level-ish ground - and then clearing it of rocks and branches and pine cones - was another step that had to happen. On top of moving gear into the tent in the evening, and moving gear out of the tent in the morning. 🙂

99% of the time when you are out on the trail, driving. You choose a level site to camp. Some of the worst, most unlevel campsites that I have stayed in are in developed My plastic squares give 10" elevation, Last year, an amazing campsite in a USFS campground. I backed in, used the blocks. 5" for both front tires. Still not level. I stuffed a couple of towels under the downhill side of my sleeping pad and it was level.

Well, whether you have a slide-in camper or RTT or van or sleeping in an SUV, you'd still need to do some leveling. So this video just looks at the camping method itself. I often will throw a rock under a tire if a campsite is skewed, same as any other vehicle-based camping setup. Heh, last year at Expo PNW, my truck was displayed in the ASFIR 4x4 booth - skid plate company. Their booth setup includes putting one wheel of the display vehicles up on a ramp so attendees can more easily see up underneath and look at the skid plates. But my truck/camper was my accommodations for the expo. The plan was to roll my truck off the ramp each evening, but that required assistance/spotting, and 2 of the 3 nights, it didn't happen before the rest of the crew left for the evening. I slept in the camper significantly slanted, with one front wheel elevated probably 12" higher than the other three wheels. To my surprise, I slept WAY better than expected. Since then, I have put much less effort into leveling the truck. 😄

@@softroadingthewest Thanks for the reply. I think I've put too much effort and time in to leveling...

There's nothing I miss about camping with a ground tent, at all. 😄The Gazelle was an awesome upgrade from my previous scenario (sleeping in the cramped back of the Forester) and made for very comfortable camping on a very tight budget. But I don't miss trying to find a large enough area of clear enough, flat enough ground to pitch the tent. I don't miss setting it up (although the setup is about as painless as it gets with a Gazelle). I don't miss moving everything - cot, sleeping bag, clothes, light, heater, water bottle, power station to recharge my cameras etc - from the car to the tent, and I don't miss packing all that stuff back into the car the next morning. I don't miss riding out windstorms wondering if the tent will make it through the night. I don't miss wrestling a wet, muddy, snowy, icy mass of fabric packing up the tent after a night of winter camping, and I don't miss clearing space in the garage and setting it up again back home to dry out after a wet muddy snowy icy camping trip. With the camper, I love that: • I can sleep wherever I can park the truck • I'm off the ground • Everything I need for the night is already in there • I can stand up fully (had to stoop a bit in the T3) • The bit of tent canvas I do have is solidly anchored by the truck • I have a larger, more comfortable bed • I have a spot for my daily power nap by just crawling in onto my little "couch" without deploying anything The only thing I miss about the previous setup with the Forester is how compact and nimble the Forester itself was...much easier to maneuver around on tight trails and I could turn that car around nearly anywhere. 🙂

Zero regrets on the Topo itself, it's a superb value in the pop-up camper market. I thought I would become annoyed by needing to shift the bed panels etc but it's so fast & easy that once I got used to it, it became a total non-issue. The only thing for me - which is inherent to any pop-up canopy camper - is climbing over the tailgate to get in and out. If you saw my previous topper, you may remember the more standard camper door sort of access I had, which was much more comfortable for getting in and out of the back of the truck. Alu-Cab is the one pop-up canopy camper that deletes the tailgate and has a similar swinging door, but $$$ 😬. I mean, it's not THAT bad...everyone you see with a GFC or Super Pacific or Four Wheel Project M or Vagabond or Topo or AT Overland or Harker or Ovrlnd or whatever...everyone's climbing up over the tailgate. And you get to keep that tailgate as a "table" sort of surface which can be nice. So it's a minor gripe at most. 😄

@@softroadingthewest That is good to know! I'm just starting out with my 3rd gen Frontier I picked up used last yr. I started with a bed rack and rtt, and have been happy with it. I can see myself upgrading down the road to a canopy camper, and it's good to know there are some that aren't over 10k that are still quality. Hope that's still the case a few yrs from now.

@@softroadingthewest I contacted Topo as a first choice but they didn't offer a model for my 04 Tundra.

Nope. Ultimately IMO it has proven to be an extra, unnecessary step in setup and breakdown. I haven't used them in probably close to a year, and not once have I had the latches ever come undone or popped open by a branch. Even if that happened, the odds of all four getting unlatched somehow are next to zero. And even if THAT happened...I have driven countless times with none of the latches latched, because I'm old and forgetful 😆 and it's been fine. I do usually always have at least the rear two latches closed because I do it when I pull the roof down, but I have driven literally hundreds of miles with the front latches unlatched and again, it's been fine. As a general rule, especially in winter, I think you'd want all 4 latches pulling the roof snug to keep the seals compressed so no rain could possibly seep in, but the carabiners for me have been an unneeded redundancy...plus they add a jingly rattle. 😄 I still have them in the truck, but I doubt I will ever put them back through the latches.

I hate dust....

I've wondered about that too. We had a regular canopy on our truck and had it sealed really well but we still had some dust creep in from somewhere. It's the reason why we went a head and bought a Four Wheel Slide-in Popup Camper (Hawk shell). It certainly costs a whole lot more but it's been a game changer for us. Don's set up seems to work great for him. The thing that I noticed about the Topo Topper that is better than the Four Wheel Popup Camper is the head room in the bed area. There's a whole lot more space which makes it less claustrophobic. That was a huge issue for us on our first night testing our camper in our driveway for a few nights. We learned that hubby gets claustrophobic in the middle of the night. It's something that we never even thought of and are sure most people don't. From all the research I did on pop-up campers no one mentioned this. With Topo Topper there seems to be plenty of head space. Anyway, we ended up building a bench bed in the lower part and he slept just fine there while I got the whole upper part all to myself! Ha!

@@DanitaReynolds Not sure if you can ever get a completely dust free canopy style topper. A enclosed slide in is probably the way to go for a easy dust free environment. Well worth the cost in my opinion. I use a home made trailer and it is nearly air tight. Dust can creep in, but not enough to irritate me.

I think he has a video on installing dust protection around his tailgate and bed.

@@thewiredfox2691 Yes he does.

They are the same 1/8" aluminum as the rest of the camper construction, bent/formed for rigidity.

Good idea! That would be super useful if I can make it work.

I have driven sooo many miles with the front pair unlatched LOL. Clearly nothing's going anywhere. I imagine that the front latches may help squeeze the roof down to compress the seals and ensure rain can't possibly seep in.

@@softroadingthewest Most likely. I noticed that the roof design on the Topo doesn’t have as much overlap with the walls so more downforce on the seal is good. I won’t second guess the designers further as I’m sure they know what they’re doing.