Welcome to Botches Off -Road. Join us as we talk
about everything from gear reviews to trail stories,
tent camping to rock landing, and all things
to do with the outdoors. I got it now. I pulled
up one that has everything. Just in case you
started towards the end of it. We're good. We're
not tent camping. Not tent camping. This is a
wrap, guys. Hey, we're doing a wrap! It's been
like, whew, it's been a while. We actually have
a wrap to talk about. And with summer being over,
we're not quite as busy as we have been. I mean,
we still are, but not near as bad. Don't say
summer over. Stop. Why? It's not over. It's not
over. Summer is almost over, and then we get
the wonders of fall. And then when fall's over,
it's the best season of all. Winter! No, because
I can't camp in winter yet. I can. Well, I can't.
I'm close. I love fall. I gotta buy a tent. No,
you gotta buy a tent piece. Yeah, I was about
to say tent piece. It's actually a tent piece
and not a tent. All Mark has to do is throw a
large comforter over his tent and then put a
tarp over that comforter and he's good. He's
got insulation, waterproofing. And then he can
use his bag for the rest. That is basically what
his inner liner is. When it gets cold, I think
I'm just going to bring a comforter. And I'm
going to actually set it up on the inside. Just
kind of like put it up on the hanging peg. You
know what I mean? Like in the middle where you
put your lantern. And just use that as a little
teepee tent. Keep us warm when it gets really
cold. i've been perusing for some diesel heaters
yeah we should all really get diesel heaters
just because i mean we really we really for like
me mark allen and even if i had a fourth tent
we really only need one so i've been thinking
about finding one for cheap and just plumbing
it yeah um Yeah, I found some I'm interested
in. I don't want to spend more than like $100
on it, but there's one I really like that is
like $150. And the only thing I like about it
is that it's raised up enough that I could put
it in a packout and just send the exhaust out
without having it melt the packout. I was going
to say, you could probably do one in that packout
cooler style or lunchbox style. You know what
I mean? The tall, skinny ones like you have your
battery in. Yeah. I also am curious if they can
run sideways, because if they can run sideways,
we can put it in any packout. And I'm thinking
about doing one of the big packout XLs, because
then I could do like half of the packout as a
diesel tank. Yeah. Yeah, I'm looking at one on
Amazon that's like 230, but it's pre -built waterproof
with the fuel tank in it. And it's like in the
Apache case kind of style. It's smaller, so I'm
kind of hoping that it'll be easier to just mount
it on the side or mount it on the ground or whatever
I've got to put it, plumb it straight in. I have
the vestibule for my tent that touches the ground,
so I'll probably throw a tarp down, hook my battery
pack up to it, put the diesel heater just outside
and have it plumb straight into the tent and
be nice and cool. debating, and this sounds so
bad because I don't want to cut my swag up, but
I've been debating picking up a stove jack and
installing the stove jack for the diesel heater.
No. No. I probably will. I probably will. I don't
think you need to. Just use your zippers. Yeah.
Then I gotta worry about bugs coming in. In the
winter? That's the joke. That was the joke. No,
I don't want to hear it. I'd be more worried
about, like, frost or something. What, we got
snow fleas now? I think there are. Well, I was
going to say, no, those sand fleas. I was going
to say, aren't there snow fleas? But, no. I swear
there are. No, I swear there are snow fleas.
Maybe snow mites or something. Yeah. No, I totally
remembered these things. Yeah, snow fleas are
a thing. Interesting. Well, we definitely didn't
need them this last weekend, did we guys? No.
It was fucking miserable. I didn't even have
the rain fly on for the first night. First, yeah,
I was going to say the first two nights, right?
Well, partly. We only camped two nights. Well,
first partly of two nights. We rushed and threw
it on randomly because someone thought it was
going to rain. And other people said it wasn't
going to rain the whole weekend, so we weren't
really worried about it. But then it got real
dark. It wasn't supposed to. Real cloudy. And
we all kind of went with that first person's
idea. It was like, well, better to have it and
not need it. Good thing we had it. It fucking
rained for a while. It did. I actually just today,
well, last night I set the swag up because. my
uh my friend cody and one of our buddies from
florida our buddy from florida just moved up
here so we were having like a hangout thing so
cody and our buddy came over and we hung out
for a little while and turns out cody just got
back from australia and he's looking at my truck
he's like that bag on your roof looks like a
giant swag and i'm like that's what it is yeah
surprise surprise I got that out to show him
because he just bought a something or other off
-road swag while he was over there. And he thought
that he was being all unique and stuff. And here
I am having one for months before he even left
for Australia. But yeah, so we set that up. And
then today I got the hose out and rinsed it down
and swept the inside out and then rinsed that
down and let it dry. And then through the...
mattress in it i haven't even taken my other
truck yet i i'm gonna be honest i didn't love
that tent this weekend or that weekend i just
yeah it just wasn't it was massive and i know
we were talking about having a vestibule but
as the weekend went it was like the vestibule
became pointless because if we were in there
we were sleeping if we weren't in there um you
know we were outside and If we wake up in there,
the kid immediately opens the tent to go outside.
He does not want to be in that tent any longer
than he has to. And that was the thing is when
I said that, I was thinking like if it rained,
it'd be nice to have somewhere you could sit.
But if the kid's sleeping, you can't really sit
in there and do anything because it's just going
to wake the kid up. Yeah. So not only that, it
wasn't hard to put up. It was kind of a pain
in the ass with it soaking wet and covered in
dirt to put back. And as we were trying to pack
it up, get it packed down into that little bag
it was in, we were just like, dude, this kind
of, I don't know if this is our thing. I'm typically
a full water or full rain shell kind of guy,
a rain fly kind of guy. it leaked in a couple
different places not horrible but enough to have
a little puddle in there and it's just one of
those things where it was like i don't think
this is gonna make its second debut on the coast
of lake superior you know i think that's no i
i agreed with you as i was watching you use it
i'm like man that's like the size is nice I can't
fault it for its size, but what I can fault it
for is it's not designed well. I think the only
thing I think it had going was a setup in the
poles. Yeah, everything else sucked, and I'm
on your side with that. It wasn't great. It'd
only be really okay if you had a cot, and even
then... Yeah, and it was like, with it being
so large, we had such a... a large amount of
space on either side of where we were we were
rolling off we like we had no i couldn't hug
the wall like i like to because it's cooler uh
right you know and the kid was like pushing us
off the side he couldn't get comfortable and
it was just weird it was like like even the sixth
person we have it's a little tighter it's a little
bit more uh I don't know, man. I can't explain
it, but all I know is we slept like shit the
first night, and I think part of it was just,
it's almost like being in a new house. Like,
you know what I mean? So, just, I was like, huh,
I can't fucking sleep here. They do make a smaller
one, and honestly, I think, not telling you you
should get another core tent, but if you were,
I think that that would be a much better option.
um because it'd be faster to set up faster to
tear down than that big one and it just it's
not big you know what i mean yeah yeah we just
don't need anything this big and the uh and if
i was to get another four person five or six
person it would be a full rainfly which i'm sure
they have one because they have a full rainfly
for the 12 person too it's just i didn't we just
didn't need it it's It's one of those things
where it takes up more space, it's heavy, and
it's a cabin tent. Right. And if we utilized
that space, that'd be one thing, but we were
not at all. Yeah, and with it being a cabin tent,
it's just different than what you tend to need.
Yeah. So, I get it. But, other than that, what
I did like about it was that... There was a lot
of area to open windows. You could really let
a breeze go in through there. If there was a
breeze, it would have been really nice. But that
first night, it was dead. There was no breeze
whatsoever. Thank God for my fan. That was the
only thing that saved me from maybe just going
home because I was sweating. But other than that,
you know. It was good. That was the first time.
Well, that was the second time. So the kids camp
Saturday, that was hotter than what we had by
a good long shot. And Sienna and I and the kid
were in that smaller six person. And we were
like, we're about ready to go home. We were soaked
in sweat. It was so hot that night. So that started
making me think about, you know, ACs aren't the.
worse you know so i i just went down that road
too and it just to get an ac that can reliably
run for more than like four hours it's just it's
so much money it is a lot of money and and a
lot of effort and a lot of extra space to take
up and honestly i can deal with it like i don't
want to It's a creature comfort, but I can deal
with it. I put a fan on. I'll eventually fall
asleep. It's just miserable until I do. And I'm
at the point of maybe I just don't camp in July.
I know this one was August, but it was really
early August. Yeah, and I was kind of the same
way, too. I talked to Sian about this, and I
was like, maybe if we start camping in the summer
like this, it's only in the north, like where
it is generally cooler. Because we're on the
coast of Lake Superior or Lake Michigan up north,
and you have that wind blowing. It's automatically
a little cooler than being inland as far as we
were. And it was, yeah, it was just, I mean,
the camping experience is great aside from that.
But, man, those two days, though, that whole
weekend was just horrible until it rained. Thank
God. Yeah, it is. I slept like shit both nights,
but that was just because we had the dogs with
us, and there's just nowhere for them to sleep
when we have the swag. I mean, it's great if
it's just me, Kaylin, and Jackson, and maybe
one dog, it's fine. But as soon... Okay, as long
as it's Mercy. As soon as you add Wrangler to
the mix, we're done for. Yeah. Especially because
he slept with us the second night. The first
night, I made him sleep in the truck. But he
was having... hip problems so he wouldn't even
lay down like he was constantly getting up that
whole night and it was driving me nuts yeah he
was not feeling good poor puppy so i slept good
the first night because i came back from a work
show so i was really tired yeah but that second
night i had a hard time getting comfortable in
the mattress pad i have so i'm gonna have to
look in to get a different one i think most of
my problem with the one i have is that it's not
meant for the cot it's more for um you're right
uh mummy style sleeping bags right right you
should you should try my uh my actual army issued
one yeah i know it doesn't get as thick and it
doesn't have as much of an r value i'm not worried
about r value right now but that's what my solution
is i gotta look into that style And I mean, oh,
what's the worst that happens? You have to get
two of them to up the R value? Yeah. Which is
probably not a bad idea, honestly. And with the
Army -issued ones, you can get them for like
$40. So $80 for a decent R value, that's not
bad. No. Oh. Also, something I wanted to add,
too, is because of the rain and packing up the
tent, it was more miserable than it needed to
be with all the dirt on the bottom of it. My
other tents. I have my dagger. It has a built
-in moisture barrier that you lay out first that
helps with that. And my other one, we typically
have a small tarp that we put under it or a canvas
tarp for packing. Yeah, I need to order or get
a tarp for my swag because what I usually do
is I open up the bag. And the bag works as a
ground sheet, right? So the tent lays on top
of the bag and that is your ground sheet. But
this camping trip in particular, that bag got
so full of water and dirt that when I folded
it up, like when I opened it the other day, there
was standing water in the bag. So I'm like, well,
I got to do something about this. Yeah. I'm kind
of like when our bag was soaked too, because
we left it outside, but yeah. Yeah. One of those
things where you're just kind of like, all right,
we need to adjust our plan a little bit. But
we had fun. Alan went fishing and stuff, and
he did a lot of fishing. Caught literally nothing.
Caught literally nothing, but I think it was
the bait he was using. Using just the wrong type
at the wrong time of day kind of thing. Because
that was basically a pond, and he was trying
to run frogs and stuff. And in a pond, really
the only thing you're going to catch anything
on is worms. Like, it's not like a lake. A lake,
you can catch stuff with actual bait, but in
a pond, it tends to be worms. Maybe minnows.
Sometimes flies, but yeah. Yeah. Gotta be small
stuff. No, it's fun. I threw the canoe on the
roof, so we had the canoe out there. Yep. We
did a bunch of trash cleanup, and... cleaned
up the site really good everybody started helping
and doing that and uh aside from some stuff that
we just couldn't pick up or stuff that we weren't
gonna risk touching because it's a potential
yeah potential biohazard other than that it was
pretty good i think all we left behind was that
poop bucket and the bed spring the glass but
that was like i said that's there's no way that
we'd be able to pick that up someone like shattered
one of those windows that didn't have a protection
so there was a bunch of like quarter inch by
quarter inch shards of glass in one area it was
like we didn't have any kind of way to sieve
it out it just wasn't yeah any way to do it but
other than that we did some uh what was it saturday
we went looking out for some water to swim at
And all the traveling we did, and we didn't really
find much. We found a riverside park that we
stopped at, and a couple of us just got in the
water for a little bit. No swimming was had.
No nice beaches near us or anything, unfortunately.
There might have been. We just had to look a
little harder. Yeah. Doing it on the go is always
a little harder than kind of knowing what's there
beforehand. It was still fun. I like the driving
around part. I got some good rollers of everybody.
Oh, yeah. Got a little bit more content. So if
you see any rollers on our Instagram here any
time recently of any of the trucks here, it's
some rollers that we got that weekend. Yeah,
your reels have been pretty funny. They've been
pretty good reels. Yeah. i'm trying to slow down
a little bit i'm scheduling them out i'm doing
like three or four or five of them and then just
scheduling them um so i'm not doing like five
at one time so i really like the need for speed
one though yeah those are pretty cool yeah yeah
i was uh messing with cap cut on that and then
i'm now i'm messing on filmora a little bit um
filmora's got a lot of stuff on it too I just
found a really cool thing with Instagram edits
where you can make your own cutouts. Oh, yeah.
It's really intuitive. Because I could do it
before with CapCut and stuff, but it's way, way
better with edits. So I'm hoping that they flush
that out a little better. Yeah, it's really cool
with Filmora and CapCut because you can use AI
to help you find a template. And then you can
switch to different templates. So I've been dabbling
with that a little bit too. Like the Need for
Speed one was an AI -suggested template. So I
selected three tracks or three videos that I
wanted to try to mess with. And then I described
what I was kind of looking for. And then they
gave me a bunch of different templates that might
work for me. And then I kind of go through there,
select them, crop the vehicles. change the timing
so that it shows more of the vehicle, and then
change the wording or whatever, and then post
it. So it still takes some time, but it does
help me kind of narrow down some templates too
that makes it a little easier. So that's nice.
I love the promo you made for cords and calf,
even if you misspelled cords and calf. Did I?
Yeah, you spelled it C -O -R -D -S and cafe.
It must have auto -corrected because I know for
a fact I typed in C -O -O -R -D. I called it
out in the group chat before you posted it, and
then you posted it, and I'm like, ah, whatever.
I didn't even see you call it out. That's the
issue. I saw that you sent it out. Yeah, I don't
even see it. That's okay. We'll take that one
down at some point and I'll edit it and put it
back up or something like that maybe. We'll see.
But yeah, it was a really clean video. I'd love
to get that one fixed and cut off the CapCut
part at the end. And then we can make a few more
of those and upload them. Yeah, just do different
rigs. Yeah. Because we could start using those
every month. Or episode. Yeah, that too. You
could do it. You could drop it every episode.
Just put the title of it. Keep it fresh. Yeah,
you know. Put a couple vehicles. New episode
out. Now that we're 20 minutes in, what's everyone's
weekend plans this weekend? I'm kind of hoping
to get my table slide reconfigured. Oh, yeah,
I did that. I put a table slide in my truck.
I forgot about that. Yeah, we'll have to talk
about that at some point. Yes, we will. And then
if I have the motivation, the weather cooperates,
I might work on some lighting. Yeah, Gavin, do
you got anything planned this weekend? Clean
the truck out, reorganize it, take inventory,
make a checklist of what I need, what I don't
need, and get it ready for Labor Day. Yeah, I'm
going up to my grandpa's camping this weekend
in rain and thunderstorms. That'll be fun. Like
I was telling you guys, I plan on just taking
the canopy up and then putting the swag in the
canopy. Yep. Just for that extra little bit of
dry space, but still having plenty of bed space.
Mm -hmm. So... Yeah, it'll be interesting. I
thought about just taking the $100 tent, to be
honest, but the problem with taking the $100
tent is then I got to get my cot, and my cot
has a hole in the air mattress, so... Yeah. Yeah,
some idiot left it outside. The cot's not bad.
No, I'm talking about the tent. That's not even
that bad. I know. You just lay it down and pull
it tight. $100 tent. Is that the Walmart one
or whatever? Yes. Yeah, that one that we bought
two of them. You can borrow mine. You can borrow
that core. Yeah, it leaves me in the same boat
where I'd have to have my cot, though. And the
mattress has a hole in it. A giant cot. That's
fun. I bet you that if you took the zippers from
that core tent and pulled them up to the top
instead of having them near the bottom, it would
stop that leak. A lot of times with that style
tent, that's where your issue usually is. They
have covers over the zippers, though. I was going
to say, isn't it an L zipper? So it only goes
down and then side? They have, it's a little
flap that goes over the whole zipper section.
So I don't understand how it was getting in.
Yeah, I'd have to look at it. I don't mind if
I don't have the zippers like up to a corner,
then it leaks really bad. Yeah. No, I, that is
a, it's a valid point, but it does have like
an. inch cover. A little plastic tent cover or
whatever that goes over the zipper. It's sort
of fine. How the fuck does the water get in there
then? Mine's a flap like this. Mine's a flap
like this and if I don't have the zippers in
just the right spot, it leaks. So weird. Such
a weird design flaw. It's almost like they didn't
seam tape that top part of that and it's just
seeping in through the top. They may not have.
Who knows? I didn't look for seam tape, did you?
No. I just assumed it would be waterproof. And
you know what assuming does. Yeah, I mean...
I don't hate the design of the quartet. I just...
I think the four -person would probably be better
overall. Yeah. I don't know. I love our six -person.
We bought that for $140. And that thing has,
other than the tent poles being kind of heavy,
other than that, that thing has been just a trooper.
It survived. Of course. I had to ratchet strap
to this truck, but it survived being in the middle
of a fucking windstorm on Lake Superior. It survived
many rains with no... uh leaking issues whatsoever
no water in at all um we had two inches of water
in it earlier spring kids camp underneath it
and it was acting like a water bed and we had
no water inside so that thing has been awesome
too bad you didn't just have like 400 sitting
around to get one of the uh asasia tents asasia
never heard of them i'll send you a link It's
like an upgrade. You've seen them for sure, though.
It's an upgrade from the Gazelle. Basically.
They pop up like a Gazelle, but they have better
doors and windows, and they're better waterproofed.
They have an inflatable base that you can get
for them. Oh, like that tent we were looking
at last week? With the inflatable bottom? It's
that type of material, yeah. But the air floor
is like another $370 fucking dollars. Nice. I
mean, they're very cool tents. Oh, I totally
just sent the links, but I didn't send them to
you. I sent them to someone else. Yeah, I was
looking. Didn't see it in my camera. I was like,
where's the link? I can't want to look. Yeah,
so, I mean, one of those might... be good for
you guys, but again, they're fucking ridiculously
expensive. Oh, yeah. Like, you've definitely
seen them before. Or at least seen pictures of
them. Alright, alright. That's the one I have.
Yeah. Oh, I thought you were talking about the
link I sent. I'm like, no, you don't. Yeah, I
do like having the rain fly that far over it.
I do like your Colorado. It's a pretty nice stat.
Yeah, dude, for what it is. For the price, too.
I mean, it is not bad. I don't understand where
I went good on that. I took a chance. Turned
out really well. Did I send the same one twice?
Son of a bitch. Yeah. Yeah, you did. Full rain
fly. Three season. Yeah, it's... Yeah, this is
the air floor for it. Oh, you're Colorado? Yeah,
I haven't looked at it online. I haven't looked
at the specs. The... space a saucy or whatever
the hell they call it they're just they're really
decent that might i don't know that's why i said
i don't know what it's called i don't know either
oh it floats on water too yeah see yeah yeah
they're they're just super nice tents for what
they are um yeah and the inflatable base is cool
i don't know of a world where i would necessarily
use the inflatable base but I mean, you deflate
it a little bit. Well, I was going to say you
deflate it a little bit, and we use our sleeping
pads like that, so you could probably just sleep
on it like that as an actual mattress. Maybe.
Because those would be pretty comfortable. But
I do know that it's a lot more cold weather friendly
than a gazelle. and with that inflatable base
it raises the r value inside the tent a boatload
yeah yeah yeah i uh i really hope that i won't
have to buy another tent so i i love looking
at tents like i look at them a lot um just because
they're so cool um There was one I wanted a long
time ago. I think it was called HemiPlanet or
something. It was a fully inflatable tube, like
the structure was inflatable. Oh, my God. Yeah,
I've seen those. It was like $1 ,000, and it
was sick. Yeah, HemiPlanet, original. Yeah, that
was sick. I looked at it just for the... The
way that it looked. Everyone was staying structurally.
It was really cool. That was just kind of my
thing. I really want the Apex modular tent system
because you can zip multiple tents together.
It's just hard to actually bite the bullet and
buy it. When we were going to buy it, they were
sold out. We were going to buy that when we bought
the $100 tent. That was the original plan. Right.
Yeah, I sent a link to that Hemi planet. That
thing is just so cool. The giant tent thing that
we can put together. Yeah, I sent a link to the
Apex, too. Yeah, the Apex. Yeah, a little tent
city going on. Dude, that Hemi planet's fucking
wild. Yeah, isn't that sick? It's so cool. It
kind of reminds me... Yeah. And all those tubes
have, like, baffles in it, so if one part, like,
pops or something or rips, it shouldn't bring
down the rest of the tent. It should be fine.
And it supposedly can handle some heavy wind.
It reminds me of that other Light Fighter tent.
The Catamount? Yeah. that reminds me of this
guy it's i still want like i've i have the same
problem with tense dude like i want a light fighter
light fighter 2 so bad but i have literally no
use for one because i have the swag yeah it's
so nice dude 11 it's 11 pounds double rip stop
oh dude so cool they even have an xl now which
is the bigger the bigger version That puts it
really close to a catamount thing, because a
catamount's 10 .9 pounds. Similar footprint,
similar, like, obviously not inflatable, but
similar structure design with, like, the multiple
pole hoops like that. Takes one minute to inflate.
The thing, the reason I like Light Fighter Tent
so much is that you can just buy parts for them,
like, readily just go buy parts from their website.
Yeah. But, I mean, same thing with 23 .0. If
I break the swag, I can just call them up and
get order parts. So. Yeah, customer service is
always something I don't want to look into when
you're buying tents and stuff like that. Especially
if you're spending lots of money on them. Yeah.
Yeah, $1 ,200 at that point. Yeah. If you're
buying a $140 tent. probably don't need to worry
as much about customer service but what i'd say
once you hit like that that 400 mark that's where
i'd really start caring about customer service
yeah yeah because after after you hit 400 it's
not like you can just drop it and go buy another
tent right away right so no no that and that's
a lot of money to to spend on it too like Well,
we're at our 30 minutes already, dude. Yeah,
I was going to say, it's time to collar it up
and get out of here. All right. Yeah, thanks,
guys. It's nice doing a... Fuck, what do we call
these? Rap. It's nice doing a rap again. We're
going to be doing these weekly again. Like I
said, things just got a little crazy over the
summer, and we just didn't have the time to do
it. We'll see you on the next one for the next
sandwich. Catch you later. Later.