Am I in the right place?

[Pete79]

I've been hanging around here for a little while and now after I've had a bit of a rant, asked some dumb questions and given some bad advice I figured I'd better introduce myself properly. 

I signed up here just to have a look around as our family are all made keen campers, but I was thinking I didn't really belong here.
You see we love 4WDing, exploring, bush camping and all the fun things of outdoor life.
But.......
We do our absolute best to avoid caravan parks, we don't drive a Cruiser or a Patrol and our trailer weighs less then 600kg fully loaded.   
So should I just leave now??   







Only joking.
I can see there's a great mix of people in here and I've been picking up some good ideas for our touring setup from you all.

Speaking of our setup
As I said we're mad keen campers, but we're tent campers through and through.
I'm here because I built a tough little custom trailer to drag our camping gear into any remote site that we want to go and check out.
My logic is that I want complete freedom to be able to take on any track that I want and camp at any site I want.
As most of you would know, there are so many great camping sites around this country that don't cater for camper trailers. There's always a short walk from the car to the camping area or the sites are too small or the just don't let you in with big trailers.

So I built my own compact little trailer that fits everything we need to remote camp for a week or more.
We're compact, so we can't go for months without stopping for supplies. But 10 days without seeing a town (or another person) is no worries for us.

Last year we spent 69 nights in a tent.
That included exploring all through NSW, a VIC high country trip and a lap of Tassie.

So that's G'day from me and I look forward to picking up some more tips and ideas from you all out there.



Couple of pics of my setup.

[GGV8Cruza]

Welcome to the Forum, a great little tough setup you have there

GG

[Troopy_03]

Your setup looks the goods mate.. I don't belong myself, I sold the CT and bought a caravan lol

[grmas1]

Nice compact setup. I am also a fellow newbie that has joined the camper trailer world.

Welcome

[KingBilly]

Welcome to myswag Pete.

Love your setup.  Simple and effective.   

Happy camping
KB

[jayjay]

Love your pics. And welcome!!
I think what your pics illustrate is how differently we all do camping- your set-up looks amazing and really well thought out- and I love your rationale for why you have it the way you do- makes perfect sense!
There is so much variety here and we all have much to learn from each other.

[Bullant4x4]

Hey Pete, just moved up from the blackwolf to a CT. I loved the Blackwolf but since I do all the setting up, cooking, cleaning, packing and planning, I had to give myself a little bit of a break

Happy camping.

If you're looking for tracks etc, head over to 4x4earth. Great bunch of blokes.

Enjoy

[sol]

G'day and welcome Pete.
Great setup you have there

       

[Pete79]

Thanks for the warm welcome guys.

I'm very lucky my wife loves camping as much as me and everything we do is shared. So setup and packing is no stress for us. We've actually got a good little system going these days.

My trailer setup has been evolving over the last 2 years or so, the inside fit out is almost sorted now.
But when I built the chassis and suspension my big concern was weight. So I only put on a 39mm round axle. It was ok for the 27 inch tyres that I started with, but now I've got 30s on it and want to go up to 33s to match the JK. That means an axle upgrade is coming soon, I'm also going to modify/extend the drawbar and hitch mount while I'm at it.

Actually that's really why I signed up here, I needed some ideas for the next (and hopefully final) mods that I'm planning.

Might have to start a build thread one day.

[MattNQ]

Nice setup Pete. No need for a camper if what you have works best for you.

When I first bought my trailer, we just used it as way to cart the tent and gear. Worked a treat.

Eventually I put a camper top on it, but every so often I look at it & wonder whether I should have just  left it as a trailer & bought a quick setup tent.
National Parks seems to like bollarding off the nicest sections of some campgrounds.

But in the end, having an inner spring mattress to sleep on keeps the wife a happy camper.

Welcome & enjoy the forum!

[Pete79]

Thanks Matt.
Bedding is really the hardest/worst bit. We have really good Thermarest self inflating mattresses and some ridiculously expensive hiking style stretchers, so we sleep comfy. But they are the longest and least pleasurable part of packing up camp.

We had to admit to ourselves that we had a bit of an addiction a little while ago.
When you've got 5 different types of tents and a swag in the shed to choose from you have to start asking yourself some questions.

We've culled it down to 3 tents and a swag now.

[Joff]

Thanks Matt.
Bedding is really the hardest/worst bit. We have really good Thermarest self inflating mattresses and some ridiculously expensive hiking style stretchers, so we sleep comfy. But they are the longest and least pleasurable part of packing up camp.

We had to admit to ourselves that we had a bit of an addiction a little while ago.
When you've got 5 different types of tents and a swag in the shed to choose from you have to start asking yourself some questions.

We've culled it down to 3 tents and a swag now.

Don’t sweat it. We have 3 swags, 2 hiking tents, a touring tent, a behemoth 2 room tent, a marquee tent, a roof top tent and a camper – (yet my 17yo still prefers to sleep on the back seat of the cruiser at parties though lol) – half a dozen self-inflating mattresses

Additionally, we have 5 different ways to cook stuff with gas, 3 different ways to cook stuff on open fires, 8 camp chairs, 3 different toilet options, 3 options for vehicle mounted awnings, 3 different ways to pump tyres up, 2 fridges, 2 roof cages, 3 forms of radio coms and a generator 

[Pete79]

Haha, easy to get to that stage I know.

I've been moving all around the country for work over the last 15 years or so. You tend to cull a lot of things when moving interstate, but we're still not that far behind you with our collection of 'stuff'.

[Sixpack]

Welcome to Myswag Pete, you will certainly find a large variety of people and info here mate.   

[tracker]

Welcome Pete.....All you need in your set up now is a MySwag flag....Ohhh..!!!! Don't forget there is alway's a few nut's in a fruit cake.....

                Cheers Tracker.

[speewa158]

Welcome to the " Zoo "   , l ask myself the same question all the time . Would you want to be in a group that would have a bloke like me in it                              

[tk421]

Welcome - that looks like a nice well thought out setup. If it suits your needs and suits them well, then job done as far a I'm concerned.   I've progressed from minimalist 80km cross country hikes, out hunting sleeping under tarps,  under and in the back of landcruisers & bivvy bags 20 years ago to a nice comfy CT.   Whatever works for you is all you need.

I look at my mates CT with bells whistles and a massive set up time and think "I couldn't deal with all that crap", he looks at my basic set-up and thinks "I couldn't slum it like that" but we both spend many weeks camping together having a great time. And at the end of the day that is what its all about.

[Pete79]

Well I finally started that build thread.....

You can check it out here.
http://www.myswag.org/index.php?topic=50526.0