365 days with my Truck Camper

hidden fly rod racks, transporting game meat, and a Wes Anderson LARP hotel

Last spring I wrote some perspective on lightweight truck campers and a few initial impressions of my first month with a Super Pacific (you can read that here). It has now been a full year since the install, and my camper has seen and done just about everything that I have. From surf trips in central California to a 3-week hunting trip across the west, and many overnighters in between, I have now officially put it through the ringer. Over that time, I’ve made some easy yet game-changing tweaks to how I have it set up, and have gained a slightly renewed perspective on these type of lightweight truck campers altogether. Here’s a breakdown of what's worked, what I’ve added to it, and what's next for my rig:

What I like

1) I have now camped more in the last 365 days than I did in the previous 5 years combined. This camper makes it so easy to say yes and go at a moment’s notice.

2) My daily driver works double duty as an adventure rig. For an outdoor activity generalist with one vehicle only, this set up cannot be beat. It excels on gnarly country roads yet around town it’s not overkill.

3) It’s clearly the best-built product available of any version of this type of wedge camper, and it’s on track to outlast my actual truck. As far as most gear that I own, it is the final boss of buy-once-cry-once.

4) I am regularly throwing very messy things into the back, so having an open truckbed remains a top benefit of this style of camper. In August I transported a whole deer in the back, and in November I drove out of the woods with 12 elk quarters that Foster Huntington and I packed out, both times with zero hesitation or worries of making a mess. I’m constantly packing and unpacking coolers, crab pots, wetsuits, and other gear, so the convenience of being able to just go home and hose it off is hard to beat. I will miss the open truckbed if I ever decide to upgrade to camper that is more like a living space that needs to be kept clean.

The aforementioned deer on a hot day in August, the final day of Blacktail Camp ‘24

What I’ve changed

1) Nothing says “I’m A Huge Fly Fisherman” like a rod vault does. Unless you are a full-time fly fishing guide, I’ve never really understood the need for one of these. It seems like a lot to be lugging around that thing 24/7. It’s funny how many of these I see in the Bay Area. I do often keep a fly rod in my truck, but I also don’t want to be peacocking around that I have an expensive rod on me with a giant oblong apparatus on my roof. Taking inspiration from flats skiffs that I’ve been on in the Keys, I discovered these boat gunwale rod hooks that cost $35 and immediately drilled them into my truckbed above the right wheel well. I keep my rod rigged up and broken in half, and use these rubber gear wraps to keep the rod pieces tidy. The gunwale hooks fit in the bed of my Tacoma as if it was a custom OEM part, and I’ve driven on very shitty roads and never had a single issue with anything coming loose or breaking.

Here’s how easy it is to grab it and go fishing:

2) I got a hitch carrier this fall in the middle of my deer and elk hunting trip. I was not expecting to have success on both hunts, and when I did I needed more space to bring meat home, so I had one shipped out there while on the road. It’s nice to keep a large cooler (mine was 160 liters) outside the truck on a trip like that - makes it easier to access and move around when it weighs hundreds of pounds, and frees up space in my truck bed. I usually crack the cooler drain plugs while transporting meat, and the hitch carrier enables water from my cooler to run amok outside instead of in my truckbed. It’s also nice to keep firewood outside. A cherry on top is that it’s a great step stool for getting into my camper.

This was about the moment when I realized I would need to figure out a heating system for my camper.

3) There’s two types of inflatable mattresses… ones that leak, and ones that are about to leak. Mine leaked on my very first night in the camper even though it was brand new. (To be fair, the Exped Megamat that it came with was very comfortable when it held air). I also didn’t like having to inflate and deflate it every time I needed to use it. So for those reasons, I was out. I replaced it with a HEST and haven’t looked back. It is not cheap, but fits my sleeping platform like a glove. It’s simply less failure-prone and takes less effort. Someone once told me “the two things worth overspending on are a good pair of boots and a good mattress, because when you’re not in one, you’re in the other”. I would agree.

4) I added a stretchy cargo net that I got for $15 on amazon (pictured below). I zip-tied it to the fuselage of the camper and it’s where I keep my sleeping bags, pillows, and extra puffy layers. Keeps the sleep stuff up and away from the mess and is a good use of negative space in the camper that would otherwise not be filled with anything anyway.

Loaded up after my fall mule deer hunt.

5) I also added a few pieces of flair. You do want to express yourself, don’t you?

What the future holds

I learned the hard way this fall on my 3-week hunting trip out west that my camper is not currently set up for sustained comfort in 0-15 degree temperatures. After all, it is still technically just a tent. You can get through a few nights pretty easily with a really warm sleeping bag, but managing the cold starts to get old pretty quick. And when you inevitably come off the mountain soaking wet, the last thing you want is to wake up to wet boots. Point being, if you are a human, warming up and drying gear out is essential for being able to stay out there longer than a single night. This is a trip that I will continue to do every year in the late fall so I desperately need to add a heat source to my setup. Sometime soon I plan to install both a diesel heater as well as a wood stove.

As long as I have my Tacoma, I will have this camper. It doesn’t make sense to have any camper that’s heavier or more cumbersome on a truck of this size. If I had a longer-bed truck that I could sleep in (my bed is only 5’), I’d consider downgrading to a simple camper shell and going full stealth mode…but I love my current set up and have no plans of changing it. Its versatility is hard to beat for my specific needs and I don’t want to lose the double-duty ability and nimbleness that it has. For at least a few more laps around the sun, it has well-earned its place.

I still haven’t wired the taillight, maybe someday I’ll get to that.

The valet guy outside this Wes Anderson LARPing hotel thought this was funny, too.