It was a pretty amazing day yesterday. After getting the Landcruiser, I had to return the rental car. So I drove to the Budget drop off, unfortunately they were not open quite yet. I should have checked ahead of time. Oh well. Instead I drove back the hotel ,picked up the Landcruiser and drove it to the mechanics shop.
What? Did you think that I bought a perfectly good vehicle? Psh. What's the fun in that?
All it needed was tires and an alignment. I was fortunate because there was a gentleman that had just bought new tires for his vehicle. Guess what it was? A Landcruiser. Since he did not need his brand new old tires I had those mounted on my Landcruiser. While the Landcruiser was getting a new set of tires, I was able to drop the rental off and Uber my way back the shop to pick up the Landcruiser. I also decided to get some cheap insurance and have an oil change done and a quick inspection to let me know what, if anything would go wrong. Amazingly both mechanics I took it to said the same thing. The vehicle was almost in perfect condition. Not to bad for 217,000 miles on the odometer. Well done Toyota.
I still needed a place to sleep. The Landcruiser has a lot of space but it would be cramped with my gear, another person and their stuff come the 24th. After a lot of debate between friends and arguing with myself, I decided on a Roof Top tent. Particularly a Tepui Kukemon 3, from REI. No real reason for that particulaer tent other than it was in stock. Beggars can’t be choosers here. REI - Sacramento has some incredibly helpful people that just loved what I am trying to do and they helped get the tent out to me and installing it. I then spent the next 2 hours getting the tent on the roof of the Landcruiser. Short jokes aside, I wish I had a ladder for this thing. However, this did allow me to meet Christian.
Christian just so happened to be walking his dog around the block and saw that I was having some trouble. He graciously offered his help in getting the tent on the top of the Landcruiser. I could tell his dog, Larkin, was impressed. After saying goodbye to Christian, I finished attaching the tent. Time for the truth. Amazingly it stayed on to the hotel so I could gather my stuff and check out.
On the way to South Tahoe Lake, I did have the opportunity to help out a fellow traveler in a Maserati. I don't think his girlfriend appreciated my jokes about italian cars but Her boyfriend took it in stride. They did ask me if I was going to the Casino and I said no. I was going to spend some time camping. They looked a little confused at that but we said goodbye and I left.
And so after a brief drive out to South Tahoe Lake and wandering around for a bit, I found a place to stay. The first night in the roof top tent was an experience. One, every time I move, the whole vehicle moves. Two, roof top tents aren’t as easy to set up as they seem but it is kinda fun and I understand why people like them. I don’t think it save me any time from a normal tent. You still have to tuck things away, zip up all the window, undo all the supports for the fly (if you put them in, which you don’t have to but I decided to try it) and make sure the zippers are not caught in anything. Then you have to put the cover over top of the and zip that on. Its a labor intensive process at times, but the advantage of it is that it is still clean and if you wanted to you could have the tent set up in about 10 mins to live in and break it down and away in about 20 with some practice. The engineering that Tepui did on the tent is amazing and neat. Only thing that I realized this morning is that I had a severe lack of coffee to make in the morning. Details.