Adventure numero-uno

Before I grab the sawzall and start hacking away at the Topagee, it's probably a good idea for us to take it camping in its raw, unadulterated, newly purchased state to see just what we've got here. Full of all my existing camping gear of course.

Mel and I travelled an hour north to the Campaspe river, where we set up camp at English's Bridge Streamside Reserve. Armed with 20L of water (and about 20L of Cider), we gave ourselves 3 nights to experiment with the Topagee. Weather for those 3 days would be hot. 36 degree maximums. Australia in January.

It did pretty well in the heat. There's fly mesh windows on all 4 sides so the ventilation is pretty good. A lot of campers have fan vents in the top and it's something I considered doing but it's definitely lower on the priority list now that we've actually tried it out.

For the first 2 nights we opted to sleep in our tent and use the Topagee as just a living space. We weren't super confident yet about how stable it'd be for sleeping - and didn't want it to end up with the nickname Topple-Gee. Sleeping in a tent with our dog Cloud was challenging. TLDR there are now 3 holes in the fly that we've had to patch up with tape. For some reason though, Cloud really liked hanging out in the Topagee during the day so it was time for the night time test.

I've still got some work to do to reinforce the fold out beds and strengthen the Topagee so to make double sure the trailer wouldn't tip, we attached it to the tow-ball of the car overnight. In went the mattress and all the gear from the tent. Sleeping in the wing was excellent, a bit warm though with those low ceilings - which is actually a hidden bonus I didn't realise. One of the big issues we have with camping is that we needed a bigger tent to go with Cloud, but big tents are much much colder. The wing in the Topagee totally nails it because you're in a pretty big space but the sleeping area has low ceilings.

Cloud even gave the bed a try the next day.

What we loved...

1. Having a 'living' room setup at a campground is a game-changer. We love being outside but sometimes you just wanna get away from the dust and dirt for a bit and be 'inside'.
2. The sleeping wing was warm, well protected and just big enough to get a double bed into.
3. It's really awesome being able to have all the sleeping stuff separate from the other camping gear. During the day the sleeping wing is always available for naps and chilling out but we never have to walk around or avoid a bed to use the rest of the camper.
4. Ventilation on all 4 sides.
5. The cafe awning mounts are pretty clever and make it way less bulky to carry awnings.
6. Carpet tiles on the floor helped a lot with insulation and having a carpeted floor when camping feels so lush!

Room for improvement...

1. Unlike our tent, there are gaps here and there that let mozzies and bugs in.
2. The door is velcro'd to the canvas mesh and is a pain to open and close. We kept it open all day but it meant letting a lot of flies in.
3. The gas cooking appliances are inside. We don't really understand why you would want to cook inside a tent. The gas leaked when we tried to use it 🙅
4. There's no access to stuff that's packed in the camper from the outside. When we're camping we spend most of our time outside so it's a pain to have to go in and out of the camper to retrieve things we need.
5. The lights that exist are MR16 halogens which are pretty high wattage. No battery came with the camper so we couldn't try them - lighting is an issue.
6. No back rests on the seats - so they're basically less comfortable than our camping chairs. We ended up spending most of our time sitting on the floor, leaned up against the cupboards.

All in all a successful mission with the ole Topagee. In its base state it's actually pretty neat. With some repairs and mods I think it might even allow us to experiment with some longer trips and doing remote working on the road 🧑‍💻 The next big challenge will be working out where to begin, but before that we'll need to weigh the damn thing...