Overlanding with a Baby | [PICTURE HEAVY] 18 days 4,400 miles

[ToRo13]

DAY 1 = I met up with my wife and 9 month old son after driving through the night 1,147 miles (Denver to Reno). Our Overland set up consist of a M101A2 Military trailer I built out and my 2017 Tundra. She was suppose to arrive at 930am so we’d have enough time to make it to Lassen National park before sunset — She missed her flight and wound up getting in at 6pm. So we pulled an audible and stayed in South Lake Tahoe. I spent most of the day driving around South Lake Tahoe. By the time I went and picked them up from the airport we were all shot and went to bed shortly after.



DAY 2 = We hit the road early to head up to Lassen Volcanic National Park. The backcountry site I had wanted to go to was blocked by a 4’ diameter Redwood that had fallen across the trail. The weather here was in the mid 30’s at night and snowing on top of the volcano. A far contrast of what was to come...

 

[ToRo13]

DAY 3-4 = Redwood National Park, the 12th Park my wife and I have visited together. Simply put — its amazing! Elk on the beach — something new for this Colorado family. A question we get asked a lot is "how do you give a 9 month old a bath when you’re camping for days on end?"

 

[ToRo13]

DAY 6-7 = Camping in Yosemite is like spending the night at a kids playground sandwiched between a zoo and an art museum. The views are stunning and there is so much to see — but the people, crowds and wild kids ?. We stoped by a convenient store while in the park and got some ice cream. As we sat on the tailgate of the truck eating and watching hikers come off the John Mirror Trail. There were a couple of guys in their mid-20's looking to hitch a ride. After about 20 minutes of watching cars pass them by –– we offered to give them a ride. The mid 20's hitchhikers had been on the Pacific Crest Trail for the better part of two and a half months and still had another three or so months to go. We we drove them about 5 mile down the road to a trail head and dropped them off. They were incredibly nice and very appreciative.

Talking to the hitchhikers for our brief drive down the road to the trailhead led me on an internal tangent for several hours. I had a lot of reminiscing into my earlier years where I use to ultra light backpack and sleep in a hammock under the stars. Then progressed or digressed [depending on how you look at it] into backpacking with a small 2 person for me and my dog. Then onto car camping in a 4 person tent with my girlfriend and our 3 dogs. Then I moved onto a Roof Top Tent with my pregnant wife and 3 dogs. Now, were in a full-sized pickup, pulling a 3/4 ton trailer with enough equipment for a small army.

 

[ToRo13]

DAY 8-9 = [Kings Canyon and Sequoia] Pretty amazing walking through the forest of giants. Our son was a great prop to create a ‘scale’ element. He’s also a phenomenal travel companion — just like his mom. We camped out backcountry is a spot that was more convenient than beautiful.

My goal when picking spots to camp typically falls into one of three categories.
1= Convenience – Need to get moving early – or don't have time to make camp.
2= Views – A place that has a spectacular view of something.
3= Water – I'll go to great legnts to camp out on water. In the land locked state of Colorado, spots like this are few and far between.

 

[ToRo13]

DAY 10 = With temperatures at 122°, 10 days of consecutive camping and 3,000 miles under our belt, we decided to stay at The Oasis in the heart of Death Valley. A very upscale hotel — it was fun dropping the truck and trailer off with valet and watching the bellhop unload our filthy gear from the back of the truck onto his shiny brass cart and then into our pristine hotel room. It also didn't stop me from washing my dirty clothes in the sink and hanging them out to flash dry in the scorching desert night.

It was here that we had our only equipment malfunction of the trip. I burnt out the solar panel. The panels got to hot and came unlamented between the resin layers. I tried contacting the company that manufactures the ultra thin flexible panels. Their phone numbers don’t work, emails kept bouncing so I wound up ordering a more traditional mono style sell that sits 1.5” instead of the 1/8” (the new one produces 4x more power than the flexible one — at half the cost!

 

[pluton]

Nice pictures, trip, family. Post more if there is any!

 

[ToRo13]

DAY 11 - We took off from Death Valley and made our way to Zion. I found a spot on Satellite I thought was to good to be true. The spot was legit, just really tight and couldn’t find an angle for photos to do it justice. Awesome night camping out on a cliff right outside Zion. Literally feet outside the park on BLM land. We had some guests after the sun set...

Amazing view from the back of the trailer

 

[ToRo13]

Day 12-13 = The wild fires burning in Utah made for a wild sunset. We camped out backcountry just outside of Bryce National Park. Not a soul around for miles, just the occasional grazing cow in the distance. It’s camping in places like this that make all the time and effort I spent working on the trailer worthwhile. Not many people can make it back this far, and of those who can — few choose to stay the night. Definitely a top 10 spot for me.

 

[ToRo13]

DAY 14-15 = We had to air down all the tires to make it to this one as the road was really rough — especially towing a trailer. Located just outside Capitol Reef National Park was this desert gem. High winds through the night didn’t make sleeping in a tent amazing (just super noisy), but we had another gorgeous sunset with some insane colors that can only be seen in the western deserts.

 

[vabluefish]

Excellent trip and report. Love the bucket bath for the little one. Do you have a build thread for the truck and trailer?

 

[ToRo13]

Excellent trip and report. Love the bucket bath for the little one. Do you have a build thread for the truck and trailer?

Pretty high level build detail. But here it is: https://expeditionportal.com/forum/threads/really-big-adventure-–-m101a2-build.192241/

 

[kylevd23]

Great report! Enjoyed the photos as well, thanks for sharing.

 

[Ryanmb21]

Very nice pictures and outstanding trip! Thanks for posting!

 

[ToRo13]

4,318 miles later — The final night of our trip we camped out in one of my absolute favorite spots. I’ve been coming here for 10+ years and it never gets old. The Gore Range at sunset is spectacular — especially while camped out on a cliff overlooking a meadow in the mountains. My wife was happy to be 90 miles from home, but I’m already dreaming of the next Really Big Adventure.

 

[Kingfish]

Absolutely beautiful photos. What camera are you using? The photos of your son in the bucket had me laughing out loud. My daughter just turned one, I am looking forward to getting her out on her first adventure.