Hi, My name is Tiffany.
I posted this in the outdoor life category but will post here too as a place to update as we improve our ride.
My hubs, Zac and I went to Moab for the first time back in October for our 3 yr anniversary. We instantly fell in love with the area but were bummed out that we couldn't go down any of the 4x4 roads in my 08 Toyota Rav4. On the long drive home from our awesome 4 night trip, we started discussing the possibility of purchasing a used 4WD vehicle to make into our "fun car". We wanted 4wd, enough space to sleep in it, and something in the 2k-4k range.
We looked at used cars feverishly for 2 weeks and then found a perfect match with 160k miles on it. This is "Koopa", the 98 Isuzu Trooper.
We removed the seats, built a very simple bed platform and inserted long plastic drawers. A full-size futon mattress fits perfectly back there and we fold it in half while driving. I sewed some curtains for it (poorly) and hung them with bungee cords and hooks screwed into the plastic. For cold nights, we use silver bubble wrap insulation in the windows which kept us very warm on our trip to Canyonlands, Needles District where it got down to 9 degrees.
While in Canyonlands, we did our first 4x4 road, the Colorado River Overlook trail by the visitor center. We definitely want to add a lift in the near future but Koopa did just fine on this trail as-is.
I posted this in the outdoor life category but will post here too as a place to update as we improve our ride.
My hubs, Zac and I went to Moab for the first time back in October for our 3 yr anniversary. We instantly fell in love with the area but were bummed out that we couldn't go down any of the 4x4 roads in my 08 Toyota Rav4. On the long drive home from our awesome 4 night trip, we started discussing the possibility of purchasing a used 4WD vehicle to make into our "fun car". We wanted 4wd, enough space to sleep in it, and something in the 2k-4k range.
We looked at used cars feverishly for 2 weeks and then found a perfect match with 160k miles on it. This is "Koopa", the 98 Isuzu Trooper.
We removed the seats, built a very simple bed platform and inserted long plastic drawers. A full-size futon mattress fits perfectly back there and we fold it in half while driving. I sewed some curtains for it (poorly) and hung them with bungee cords and hooks screwed into the plastic. For cold nights, we use silver bubble wrap insulation in the windows which kept us very warm on our trip to Canyonlands, Needles District where it got down to 9 degrees.
While in Canyonlands, we did our first 4x4 road, the Colorado River Overlook trail by the visitor center. We definitely want to add a lift in the near future but Koopa did just fine on this trail as-is.