This is the story of how the Golden Boy became a man. The Golden Boy, named after his opulent paint color, and to a lesser extent, Jerry Seinfeld’s favorite t-shirt, is our beloved truck- a ’95 Toyota Tacoma V6 extended cab. I bought it in the prime of its adolescence, at age 10 with 135,000 miles on it. As I sit in it right now, typing away, the odometer shows just over 278,000 miles. It has taken us from one side of the country to the other countless times, down endless miles of lonely road, rough back-country tracks, across raging rivers, sand swept beaches, barren deserts, and over snow clogged mountain passes. And on one particularly epic journey, safely carried us over 28,000 miles from our home in Colorado to the farthest drivable extent of the continent of South America, acting the whole time as our vehicle, our house, our security, and our trusted companion. This trip made our truck what he is today: not a boy anymore, but a man. And not just a man, but a golden man. And not just a golden man, but because we three where a bunch of whities south of the boarder, I present to you… The Golden Gringo.
Contrary to my love affair with my truck, the Golden Gringo was not actually my first thought during the very beginning of our trip planning. Our initial idea was to do our trip backwards, from South America heading north to the US, rather than driving south like we ended up doing. We were living in Brazil at the time where they happen to sell old model Toyota FJ Cruisers, like the kind from the late 70’s that you can still find here in the US, except that the Brazilian FJ’s are brand new! They never re-tooled their factories and have been pumping out the old style of trucks (along with old style VW beetles and kombi vans) for decades. The idea of driving home to the US with a brand new, but classic looking, FJ Cruiser was, in a way, the instigator of our entire crazy plan. Alas, it was not to be. For one thing, a new Brazilian Fj was going to cost upwards of $35k USD, and on top of that, it seems that it is extremely difficult to import a foreign car unless it stands up to the US emissions standards- which I doubted the Brazilian FJ could. What a disappointment it would have been to drive all the way to Colorado and be told I couldn’t get a license plate for my new truck! So, considering these facts, we started thinking that it would be much easier to start our trip in the US, where we could outfit a decent expedition vehicle for a reasonable price, and drive south, when at the end of our trip we would ship the vehicle back to the States and there wouldn’t be a problem with the authorities because that is where it originated.
Starting our trip in the US left us with two options- buy a new (or used) vehicle for the trip, or use one we already own. Obviously, our Golden Boy would be a fairly good choice for such an adventure, but the lack of sleeping accommodations initially nixed him from the list. We happened to own another vehicle that had good promise for an overland expedition to South America- a ‘78 VW Westfalia named Ollie. It would definitely need some improvements and possibly a new engine, but Ollie would be fun, stylish (is road-hobo-chic a style?) and livable- the pop-up tent being the main attraction. The things Ollie lacked were performance, reliability and most importantly, 4-wheel drive. We weren’t planning on getting into too many “4-wheel” situations, but you never know what the conditions will be like and I would hate to have our travel options dictated by our vehicle’s penchant for solid tarmac. Then, on a random google search, and a few obscure links latter, I came across the glory that is the FlipPac Topper– a compact truck topper shell that has a foldout tent similar to the Westfalia’s. If we dropped a few grand on a custom fit FlipPac for the Golden Boy, we could have all our wishes fulfilled- discreet on vehicle sleeping accommodations, and the dependability and off-road capabilities of our Toyota. That sealed the deal- the Golden Boy was going to South America.
Our timeline for modifying and fitting out the Golden Boy was sadly very short- short because we would only have 2 weeks to prepare for our trip between returning from Brazil and crossing the border into Mexico due to income tax status reasons, and sad because a true overland expedition vehicle deserves more attention than a frantic retrofit squeezed in between provisioning trips to Walmart and goodbye parties put on by friends and family. That being said, I think we did a pretty good, oh hell, I’ll just go ahead and say it- we did a damn great! job turning our run-of-the-mill Tacoma into a veritable Overland Monster.
We started off with taking the truck to the mechanic for a thorough one-over, thanks to my Mom, before we even returned from Brazil. He produced a long list of mechanical fixes and maintinence items that we would need to get the truck in good working order. In an effort to save a little cash and because I believe that if you can do something yourself, you should, I only had the mechanic perform the items that I couldn’t do easily myself- balance the tires, perform an alignment, change the transmission, differential, and transfer case fluids, flush the cooling system, flush the brake and power steering fluid, install new thermostat, and a new fuel filter, and replace a leaky brake cylinder. Everything else I dutifully hammered out in the Renfroe Auto Shop that is my mom’s driveway: new brakes and pads all around, oil change, new belts and hoses, plugs, wires, top all fluids, and new front and rear shocks.
Now that the truck was in tiptop mechanical shape, we moved on to the modifications that would make driving to South America possible, if not fun and comfortable. Almost all of the items/parts for this retrofit I purchased on the internet while in Brazil and had shipped home, so they would be ready and waiting for me to install. What follows is a rather lengthy, some might say long winded, explanation of all the modifications we performed- I could probably have been a little more concise, but for a topic as important as this, I thought detail should carry the day, and at least this way it will add a little much needed meat to our website.
1.) Security
Security for us and the truck weighed heavily upon our minds before the onset of the trip. We were caught between the overly protective concerns of family and friends fueled by sensationalized reports from the media which we had to downplay at every opportunity for their peace of minds, and our own misgivings about setting off on such a foolhardy adventure into the unknown. We sat down and thought logically about the topic, and came up with three principles upon which to base our preparations: 1. Maintaining a low profile and trying not to stick out compared to the local population would help us avoid attention from people with nefarious intents, 2. In the event that we (or the truck) did become the target of a criminal, making our vehicle as frustratingly difficult and time-consuming as possible to break into or steal would protect us in the sense that the criminals would give up and go find easier prey, and 3. In the end, no matter how hard we tried to protect our truck and belongings, if someone was irrationally intent on taking them, there is nothing we could do to prevent it, thus we should limit the possibility of our losses by not taking anything “we couldn’t live without” and coming to terms with the possibility that we could be robbed blind.
In regards to the first item, keeping a low profile, we endeavored to do this by not modifying the outward appearance of the truck in a drastic or overly “expedition” type way- i.e. we thought that putting a lift on the truck, an engine snorkel, or a winch in the front might call undue attention to ourselves. Our truck did look a bit newer and fancier than the local vehicles in most areas, but we weren’t driving around a brand new Landrover, or a Unimog, or something similarly exotic. In the end, our only really distinguishing characteristics were our slightly unusually big topper, the surfboards on the roof, and our license plates. To aid in our cultural camouflage we made it a point to never wash the exterior of the truck during the trip- for “who would take notice of an old dirty Toyota? and what could they possibly have in there worth stealing?” And in this manner were able to slip through 16 countries virtually unnoticed and unmolested. (We did have two minor incidents along the way- our license plates got stolen in Chile and someone in Peru tried to break into the back of the truck by shoving a screwdriver into the tailgate lock, but luckily they were unsuccessful because of the window locks, which I’ll get to below).
Assuming someone did take an interest in the Golden Gringo, we were concerned about three different scenarios: 1.) someone braking into the bed of the truck to steal gear, 2.) braking into the cab of the truck to steal gear, 3.) stealing the whole truck by braking into the cab or simply towing it off. To address braking into the truck to steal gear, our primary defense was to make it impossible for the thief to know what might or might not be inside. To do this, we purchased the darkest window tinting available upon our arrival in Mexico, necessarily so because it was far too dark to be legal in the US. We had every window tinted except for the front windshield, which took about an hour and cost less than $60USD. This proved to be so dark that even with your face against the glass, in the full light of day, you could not make out anything inside the cab or the bed. When we left the car for any amount of time, we made a point of putting up an expandable sunshade across the windshield, and with this in place it was virtually impossible to see inside without the beam of a flashlight, and how many robbers walk around with a flash light in their pocket? Amazingly, we were able to see out of the windows from the inside quite easily. Even when we would pirate camp on a city street, we could hear and see everyone walking past on the side walk, but they had no idea we were inside, almost like a two way mirror. The other added benefit of this dark tinting was that it kept the truck much cooler inside then it would have been otherwise.
Our next line of defense was an aftermarket two-way-radio car alarm, the Commando FM-870-TK. The Commando is unique in the fact that it communicates with the key fob up to “2 miles away” (more like a ¼ of a mile in our experience), and sends alerts to the fob if the alarm is tripped. The fob has a display that shows what caused the alarm to go off, whether it be due to the truck shaking, a broken window, or if the engine started, etc. The other useful feature of the Commando was that it would disconnect electrical power to the engine after 30 seconds if the car was started with the alarm activated and was not disarmed within that time. In this scenario, the car thief would start driving away and abruptly come to a halt when the engine died and wouldn’t start again, hopefully causing him to give up and leave our truck where it sat. The real trick with car alarms is that a good car thief knows how to easily disengage them- I’m no thief but I assume they just find the control box and pull all the wires out? And if it is a factory installed alarm, thieves probably know exactly where to search for the control box. We had the advantage of being able to hide the box wherever we wanted so they wouldn’t know where to look to disable it.
The other way they can disengage the alarm is by messing with the wires under the hood of the car, so we took the added precaution of making a hidden hood lock. Using a thick piece of plastic coated steel cable, I permanently attached one end to some holes in the underside of the hood using some cable clamps, and then made a loop on the other end. The cable was then threaded down through the engine compartment when the hood was closed, and locked to the truck frame using a padlock. I positioned the location of the cable and the padlock so that they were fairly hidden and would be hard to get at with a pair of wire cutters. When the hood was closed and the cable locked to the frame, the hood would not open at all when the hood release latch was pulled in the cab. This gave us a pretty good sense of security, but was rather annoying when we were having engine trouble and had to get under the hood ourselves.
If someone happened to gain entry to the truck, and disable the car alarm somehow, we had a few more tricks up our sleeve: I installed a “kill switch” that disabled the power to the fuel pump. Basically I just spliced a simple switch (from the hardware store) in line with the power wire going to the fuel pump, and hid the switch in a discrete place under the dash, that would be hard to find unless you knew right where it was, but it was still accessible enough to be convenient for us to flip it whenever we left the truck. With the switch flipped, the fuel pump would not run when the engine was started, thus starving the engine of gas, and making it seem like the truck was out of fuel. There would be absolutely no way to get the truck started unless you found the switch (which you would have no idea what you were looking for even if you thought there might be a switch) or traced the power wire to the fuel pump and fixed my splice, which was also hidden. The one fault with this setup was that the fuel gauge would still read full, and the robber would think that the truck wasn’t out of gas, and that maybe something else was wrong, but our hope was that they would become frustrated and give up long before they figured out our little trick. Actually, I think it would be wise to install this switch on any and every vehicle you own, considering how easy and foolproof it is. I am kicking myself because I had intended to do this to all of our vehicles, but got sidetracked, and one of our old cars was actually stolen in NYC a few years ago, which could have been prevented had I installed the switch! Bummer, but lesson learned.
Our next little trick was a lockbox for all of our valuable stuff: We bought a big metal toolbox, drilled some holes in the bottom, and then drilled some matching holes in the floor panel of the truck behind the passenger seat. We then bolted the box to the floor using some hefty ½” thick carriage bolts, placing the rounded head on the outside, and the threaded end with the nuts inside the lockbox, that way you couldn’t unscrew the bolts unless you had the box open and could get to the nuts. We locked the box with a big padlock. We usually stored our important documents, passports, extra cash and credit cards in the box, along with our cameras and lenses and computers and technology stuff. With things stored in the box, rather than out, we hoped to prevent things being taken by what they call the “smash and grab”, when the robber just smashes the window and takes what he can easily grab before running off. If the robber had time, they might be able to cut the lock off the box or something, but hopefully it would take too long and along with our other defenses, would make him give up. We had one final trick- in the event that they broke in and stole everything, including the lock box, we hid a small pouch of extra money, credit cards, calling cards and copies of our passports and keys to the truck, in a gap in the wall behind one of the speakers. If we lost everything else, at least this pouch would let us get home safely. (On a side note- when traveling, we think it is always a good idea to make copies of all your passports and credit cards (front and back) and such and email them to yourself and a family member, and give them a hard copy too.)
To protect all our stuff in the bed of the truck, we started off by installing an aftermarket tailgate lock specifically designed for the Tacoma tailgate. It felt a little chincy and plasticy, but by virtue of its design, I believe it would have remained locked even if someone pulled the handle off, or shoved a screw driver in it- case in point, this did happen. With this tailgate lock installed, it would require unlocking 3 locks to open the tailgate and get at our gear stored beneath the elevated deck (described below). The two other locks were those on either side of the flip-up rear window, which overlaps the tailgate, and needs to be opened to open the tailgate. Additionally we locked the latches that hold the topper roof down, though to break into the truck by opening the topper would require quite the acrobatic skills on behalf of the robber, and would have been a ridiculous waste of time to attempt. None the less, we wanted our truck locked up tight, so on went the topper roof locks every day when we packed up camp.
The only other thing we were worried about being stolen off the truck were the tires and license plates. To protect the wheels, I bought a set of Gorilla Locking Lug Nuts, which require a special unique socket which is grooved to only fit the lug nuts that it comes with and therefor acts like a key. The locking nuts were slightly different shape than our normal lug nuts, with a beveled profile, rather than a flat one, and I was worried that it might not achieve the same force or pressure on the matting surface between the lug and the rim, so I only installed one locking lug nut per wheel. To protect the spare tire, I secured it to the underside of the truck bed by running a thick cable through the rim, around the tire and through a hole in the truck frame, then locked it all up with a big padlock.
And now the license plates… unfortunately, we didn’t follow our own advice on this one. I had intended to weld in-place the nuts of the bolts that hold the license plate on before we left, but ran out of time. We would have been able to remove them later on with a hacksaw and some bloody knuckles, but a casual thief walking by would be thwarted. I have also heard one story of a border patrol officer in one of the more seedy border crossings remove the plates from a vehicle (without the traveler’s permission) and demand a steep “fee” (read bribe) to get the plates back. If they were welded on, this frustration probably could have been avoided. As it happened, we didn’t do anything special to protect our plates, and they ended up being stolen off the truck when it was parked on the streets in beautiful Valparaiso, Chile- which figures, those sticky fingered Chileans!, but also kind of amazes me that they lasted so long. I was also amazed that after they were stolen, my replacement plates (pieces of cardboard with the plate number written in sharpie) safely carried us around for over two weeks hassle free, across the border from Chile to Argentina, all the way across the country up to Iguaçu Falls, and then back down to Buenos Aires. Luckily, an already planned trip home, and a stop at the DMV got us some new plates. I don’t know if this is strictly necessary, but if you live in a state where they only require a rear license plate (like Pennsylvania) I think it would be an excellent idea to somehow acquire a second plate for the front of the vehicle, considering it is probably the law to have two in most countries south of the boarder, and even if it isn’t, a shady police officer will definitely use it as an excuse to stop you.
There were a few things in addition to welding the license plate nuts that we would have liked to do/install had we had the time- I would have added some heavy wire mesh or grating to the inside of all the windows in the back of the truck, to act like a cage so that even if the window was broken, the robber still would not be able to reach in and take anything. I’m not quite sure how I would have installed these or attached them securely to the structure of the truck, and putting them over windows that opened might have been difficult, but none the less, if I had time I think I could have figured out a satisfactory way to achieve this, and I hope you consider it if you are preparing for a similar expedition. Also, like our friends the Ramblewriters, I would have liked to install some “hockey puck” style internal shackle door locks on the tailgate and front doors- they stick out a bit, and might draw some attention, but would have kept the doors closed no matter what the robbers did- again, ran out of time for this one. And finally, forgetting time and/or money and the fact that this hadn’t been invented yet when we left on our trip, I would install a SPOT HUG boat alarm, which is a GPS satellite unit that is able to send a message to your, and anyone else you wants, email if the boat (or truck in this instance) moves beyond a certain predefined radius. For boats it is useful to make sure your anchor isn’t dragging, but can also help recover a stolen boat, because I believe that it keeps sending signals of the boats location. This is probably a huge luxury item, and would be cost prohibitive for most overlanders ($450 for the unit plus service fees), but would be nice if you had the resources and would provide an extreme level of peace of mind.
2.) Power
Power is kind of a luxury item when it comes to overland expeditions. Depending on what you plan on using the power for, you don’t really need anything much more than a small inverter with a cigarette lighter plug adapter- this could easily cover charging laptops, iPods, cell phones, and GPS devices- but only while you are driving. We of course had all these gadgets, but we also had a small 12v refrigerator to satisfy that occasional hankering for a cold beverage at the end of a long day of driving, which would require a bigger, better power set up all together.
We started off by purchasing two Optima batteries (the best in the industry they say)- one red top main starter battery, and one yellow top deep cycle house battery. I put the red top in the normal location, and placed the yellow top, on its side in a custom made bracket out of welded angle iron, in a small spot under the hood on the passenger side. It was a tight fit, but worked well enough. My only concern was if we were to hit a massive bump and the bolts holding the battery bracket broke, the whole thing might go flying through the engine compartment destroying the fan, belts, hoses, radiator, and who knows what else. Fortunately that never happened. If we had to do it again, I might consider placing the house battery in the bed of the truck under the deck.
We charged the house battery by using a Sure Power 1314-200 battery separator between the main and house batteries. Then we ran cables from the house battery through a hole in the fire wall and under the carpet to a spot under the passenger seat. Here we had a 12v cigarette type plug, and also a 600w inverter. The cigarette plug was solely for use by the Engle MRFD-15 portable refrigerator, because its normal adapter is for that type of plug. We ran a normal household power strip from the inverter and attached it permanently to the center console for easy access to plug in things. The fridge was positioned behind the driver’s side seat on the platform where the fold down jump seats are normally installed (we removed the jump seats for more room). We left the fridge plugged in most all of the time and set at a temperature low enough to keep the beers cold, but not frozen, which it can do. This was perfect for all our other perishables as well, like salad lettuce, deli meats, and cheese! (our normal diet). Fully charged, the house battery would keep the fridge running for a good two days, but as the trip went on, the battery would not keep a charge as well, and by the end of it we would be lucky if it kept it running for more than a few hours without the engine on. Turns out that my connection from the main battery to the house was not as good as it should have been- being that one of the connectors was coated in a thin layer of paint (who knows why?) thus limiting the ability for the battery splitter to charge it fully every time, which I believe led to its premature demise. If I had known this at the time and fixed it, I would doubtless say that the battery would still be going strong.
3.) FlipPac Topper
As I said earlier, the main deciding factor to take the truck on this little adventure was that it had 4-wheel drive and the possibility for a roof top tent thanks to our discovery of the FlipPac topper. FlipPacs are difficult or impossible to find used, so we called up the manufacturer. Turns out that there are a few dealers around the country that carry new FlipPacs, but they cost at least $400 more than if you pick up the same topper at the factory, and since we would be driving through Cali on our way to Mexico anyways, it seemed like going directly to the manufacturer was the best plan. The factory is located in Riverside, CA- outside of LA- and appears to be a family run affair. I don’t want to slander anyone, but their shop is not exactly a bastion of customer service, and in my experience the ordering process was slow, painfully inefficient, and in the end incredibly frustrating- we did end up with a topper that fit our truck, painted to match the Golden Boys roguish hue, but somehow, they simply forgot to install some special flip-up side windows (win-doors) that I had requested, and upon me noticing this when they were installing the topper at the factory, the lady said “oops” and offered to ship them to my house so that I could install them myself… she apparently also forgot why we had bought the topper in the first place- to drive to South America, which I stressed in multiple phone conversations- and we wouldn’t be “home”, to receive the windows in the mail, let alone install them, for a year. I just had to shake my head and say “don’t worry about it”.
But then she dropped “the bomb”… as we were about to get in the truck and drive away, she casually mentioned that we might not want to use the tent in the rain. “What? Are you saying the tent, the roof-top tent, isn’t waterproof?? You’re kidding me, right?” I spat out in disbelief. “Well, yes” she said, “but we can make you a custom waterproof cover for $400 dollars if you want? We can ship it to your house in 4 to 6 weeks.” “Are you dense woman!?! Didn’t I just tell you that we are driving to South America, for the 25th time?! Tomorrow!? Why the hell did you not tell me this when I was ordering the topper!?!? You and your whole company must by impermeable to rain and to rational thought. It has to take a certain breed of stupidity to design and sell a rooftop pop-up tent, to be used out in the wilderness, in the elements, and not make it out of waterproof fabric. It’s like making a raincoat out of rice-paper. Or an umbrella with holes in it! And then to not tell me of this little, but profoundly consequential fact, until the day before we are about to drive off into the wilds of South America?!? WTF!” I didn’t really say any of this, but had my eyes been lasers, she would have been a smoldering black spot on the sidewalk. I have to calm myself down right now, just thinking about it.
Contrary to their best efforts to sabotage our trip, we came up with a usable, but certainly not perfect, solution, and after frantically driving around to a handful of auto-parts stores, we were the proud new owners of a XL waterproof car cover that fit over the pop-up tent like a rain-fly. We would soon discover the problem with this solution- namely it was difficult to put on. So after only a few times of being surprised by a storm in the middle of the night- which led to us frantically dashing around, half-naked and dripping wet, trying to manhandle this giant unwieldy piece of fabric over the tent in the wind and rain, the whole time yelling at each other in frustration- we settled on a decidedly less stressful routine: any night that there was even the slightest chance of rain we would deploy the cover when we set up camp. But this presented us with another problem- it covered up the windows of the tent and made it hot, really hot, inside. So then I began propping out the sides of the cover with some long sticks to get some airflow back to the windows. The problem with this was that it effectively turned the cover into a giant sail, which with only a moderate gust of wind, would be forcefully ripped from the roof of the truck and off into oblivion, leading to more frantic half-naked dashing through the night to catch it. By the end of our trip, if it seemed like there might be any rain or wind during the night- which was often considering we were in Patagonia- we would simple keep the topper closed, and sleep on the deck in the bed of the truck, like two animals in a cave. Not exactly what we a had hoped for when we spent all that money on the FlipPac.
Long story short, there are a few design flaws that I think need to be addressed before I would recommend buying a FlipPac topper.
As far as using the topper in nice weather goes, it did have some good points…. The topper opens like a clam shell, unfolding over the cab and hood of the truck. A large torsion spring acts as a hinge and actually supports the weight of the roof, now acting as the floor of the bedroom of the tent which is cantilevered over the front of the truck, and the weight of whoever happens to be sleeping in the bed. There are two rather puny looking “support rods” attached to the top of the roof, that swivel down (when the topper is open) and attach to a pair of cleats installed on the hood/side panels of the truck. At first we thought this was the only thing they planned on using to support the weight of the roof and us when sleeping, but they actually do the opposite- and act to hold down the roof in the open position, preventing the giant torsion spring from snapping the roof shut like a mouse trap, with us in it!
Once deployed, the tent is very big and specious. A foam mattress acts as the bed, and we made a point of using bed sheets to try and keep the mattress from getting too dirty. Kacey tried only once to wash the mattress, which ended in a minor disaster… do you know how long it takes for a saturated 4ft x 6ft x 2in piece of dense foam to dry out in the humid tropics of the Mexican west coast? Even after a few days hanging in the direct sun, it was still uncomfortably moist to sleep on- we were just lucky that it didn’t mildew. Moving on, the tent has six giant half circle windows, two on each side, one at each end- which unzip from the inside, and the openings are permanently covered with a fine window screen that does not unzip. In a hot deserted spot, we loved opening up all of the windows and letting the breeze blow right through- it almost felt like sleeping outside- but in more populated locations, we felt naked and exposed with the windows open, being high up on top of the truck everyone could see right into our house!
When the roof was open, it created a large “room” above the bed of the truck with plenty of head clearance, even for me at 6’-2”. On the passenger’s side of the topper, above the bed of the truck, there was a sturdy aluminum pole running the length of the truck-bed, but at the height of the sleeping bed (the opened topper roof). A piece of strong fabric was stretched between the pole and the side of the topper, making a large shelf- or at least that is what we used it for- they told us it could also be used as a hammock for a third person, but I think that it might only be comfortable or strong enough for a child. We would move some large items and boxes from the bed of the truck up onto the shelf when we set up camp to make getting in and out easier. Similarly, another pole was positioned on the driver’s side, with fabric stretched between it and the first pole. Both pole’s were removable, being supported by open brackets at each end, and when fully positioned created a canvas roof spanning the entire truck bed, which acted to suspend the voluminous folds of tent fabric up and above the bed of the truck when the topper roof was closed. We usually didn’t bother doing this though, and preferred to keep the poles positioned such that the “shelf” was maintained and utilizing another set of brackets on the passenger’s side for the driver’s side pole, we created a hanging canvas storage “sling” to put all are soft things in- like pillows and sleeping bags- when we were driving.
Opening the topper was done by using a long metal wrench thing that came with the FlipPac. The wrench was fitted to a splined nut on the end of the torsion spring and then with all your body weight on the wrench, and a little help from your free hand to push up the roof, the topper opened like a clam shell. I was able to easily do it myself , but Kacey could never get it on her own- don’t read too much into this, but having a deuce, deuce and half, on the end of that wrench really helped me. The topper closed just as easily in the reverse manner, except that both of us had to be vigilant, working on either side of the truck, to shove in any tent fabric that tried to explode out through the seam between the topper roof and the lower topper structure. If any was left exposed, and it happened to rain while we were driving, the seal for the roof would be compromised, and we would be treated to a truck full of wet cloths and sleeping bags at our destination.
The one last item having to do with the topper was a post-installed roof rack to hold our surf boards. Originally we had intended to store the surfboards inside the back of the truck, but after our whole drive through Mexico we were thoroughly tired of moving them in and out every day. So, at a small junk yard in Belize, a group of seemingly competent mechanics fabricated us a set of roof racks out of angle iron and ½” square tubing, which we attached to the roof of the topper using long through bolts, through some holes that they drilled through the fiberglass, which was agonizing to watch lest they screw things up irreversibly. It was ugly, but functional, and allowed us to strap the surfboards to the roof with some ratchet tie-downs. This was only a slightly better arrangement though, because now we had to remove the surfboards every time we opened the topper, else they would swing over and be crushed between the topper roof and the roof of the cab. In the end, I see this as one of the main detractors of a clam shell pop up tent design like the FlipPac, and believe that an arrangement similar to the pop up tent on a Westfalia camper van would be worlds better because you could leave gear attached to the roof when you opened it.
4.) Elevated Deck
Taking a conglomeration of ideas from the internet, we designed and built a wooden deck in the bed of the truck to provide compartmentalized storage and a platform on which to sleep in the event that we couldn’t open the rooftop tent. Our main design criteria was that we wanted everything we were bringing on the trip to fit below the surface of the deck, so that if someone looked in the window they would just see a flat, empty platform, and not be tempted to break-in and steal anything. This was fine in theory, but the practice only lasted a few hundred miles down the road from our starting point because we inevitable bought more and more crap, which didn’t fit below the deck. By the end of our trip, we probably had 2 large tupperware containers, and a large suitcase routinely stored on top of the deck, which we would move and place on top of the canvas “shelf” when the topper was open, or simply squeeze in next to, to sleep, when the topper was closed. This was in addition to all the gear we had stored under the deck, the surfboards on top of the roof, and quite a bit of stuff behind the front seats in the cab.
For the compartments of the deck, we went to Walmart and purchased some reasonably sized plastic tupperware containers- 4 big boxes, and 2 long flat boxes with wheels on them for cloths- the kind of boxes you would keep under your bed. Then, out of 3/8” plywood and 1”x2”s we constructed a structure around these boxes so that they fit perfectly. The two clothes boxes were in separate compartments, one above the other, and were open to the rear of the truck so that we could open the tailgate and pull out one or the other or both to get our cloths. We obviously had to be outside the truck to do this, so it was wise to gather your clothes for the next day before you went to bed.
Next to these stacked compartments, there was a large, equally long compartment also open to the rear so it could be accessed when the tailgate was down, which stored one large plastic container with all our food and cookware- basically our entire kitchen. Conveniently, there was just enough room in this compartment above the kitchen boxes to store one of those wooden fold-up tv trays, which along with the folded down tailgate we used as our food prep area and also as our dining table. The tricky thing with this compartment was that we actually made the roof of it into a hatch with hinges that could be opened up to lay flat on the adjacent deck. With this done, the kitchen boxes moved, and the topper open, it was very easy to step up on to the tailgate, into the floor area created by this open hatch, and now be standing inside the open tent with plenty of head room. Without this hatch, you would have had to crawl up and onto the deck from the tailgate through a small area the height of the back window of the camper.
Behind the kitchen and clothes compartments there was a large compartment big enough for two of the big plastic containers, also with a hatch type lid that could be opened from either side and also taken off entirely to make it easy to move out and in the large plastic containers. There was also an additional three more compartments around the edges of the bed of the truck, but these were necessarily much narrower and irregular shaped due to the wheel wells and such. These also had removable lids for easy access, but we typically just stored loose gear in these such as extra engine oil, our scuba diving fins and spear, gas canister, spare parts, souvenirs, ropes, tools, the large Colman stove and a much more besides.
I had read of some good designs for these elevated decks in the bed of trucks that utilized lengths of iron pipe, screwed into pipe flanges, and through-bolts to physically connect the deck to the bed of the truck with the idea that if the truck were to role, the deck and all the gear stored beneath it would stay in place, thus avoiding damage and a huge mess. We ultimately didn’t go to the length of this precaution because we figured that if the truck rolled, we had a lot more to worry about than some loose gear flopping around in the back, and on top of this our hatches would all probably fly open letting the gear go wild anyways, unless we had latches on them, but that would be an inconvenience for the other 99.99% of the time weren’t rolling around on the roof of the truck. So, in consideration of this, we just went with the plan of keeping her on all 4 wheels at all times.
After assembling the deck in the bed of the truck, we covered the entire surface with a thin outdoor type carpet to make it a little more comfortable for bare feet and sleeping. All told, the deck worked perfectly and is still in the back of the Golden Gringo being used to this day.
A note on the containers: we chose all clear containers so that we could see what was in them on all sides and close to the bottom thus saving us a lot of time rummaging around trying to find things in them.
5.) Additional Equipment, Spare Parts, and Tools
The remaining upgrades we made to the truck weren’t really modifications, but rather additional equipment that helped keep the truck going and would be handy in a sticky situation. First off, a fire extinguisher is always a good idea to have on hand- we reasoned that any fire that might break out would probably occur in the engine area, at the front of the truck, so we decided that we would store the fire extinguisher away from the fire-prone area, in the rear, right inside the tailgate for easy access. I have seen extinguishers mounted under the hood for really quick access (if you are standing right there with the hood up when the fire starts), but what if you aren’t right there, or the hood is down, and now you can’t reach the extinguisher because it is in the fire? Maybe if you had two, I would put one under the hood, and one in the back, but for just one, I think it is better to keep it where you can always get it.
Another handy tool that we took, but thankfully never had to use, was a 2000lb capacity wire cable come-a-long. It’s basically a mechanical hand winch that has a hook on either end, and would be able to help pull us out of mud or sand or whatever, had we needed it. I would have wanted to also bring a large farm jack, but to use it effectively, the body of your vehicle needs to be pretty solid. As it is, the Tacoma’s side panels and such are just that, panels, and don’t really offer any structural strength, and had we tried to use the farm jack to raise the vehicle there would have been very few places we could have applied load without totally destroying the body of the truck. For a farm jack to really be useful, you need a solid truck like a jeep or landrover. Ah well, maybe next time.
The final addition to our little bag of tricks was a small 12v air compressor and an excessive supply of tire plugs. It’s probably recorded in an official study somewhere that 99% of the time you get a flat tire is from running over a nail or screw or some other equally pointy metal object, and we found that the fastest, easiest, and best way to remedy this situation was to jump out and hook up the air compressor as soon as we realized the tire was losing pressure. This would buy us a little time before the tire deflated completely- which leads to the truck settling all the way down till the rim is contacting the ground, which compresses/deforms the tire so much that the bead is broken between the tire and the rim, making it nigh impossible to re-inflate. If the air really seemed to be pouring out, I would preemptively extend the piston jack as much as possible and throw it under the axle, thus avoiding the bead breaking scenario. Either way, once we got the tire supported/filling with air, we simply removed the offending intrusion with a large pair of pliers and plugged the hole with a sticky, tar covered tire plug. This worked countless times, saving us the hassle of changing the tire for the spare, and only failed once- when our tires already had over 50,000 miles on them and a previously plugged hole ripped open causing a gash that was far too large for another suture of tire plugs. In this case, we forgave our all-star pump and plug repair team and were obliged to purchase a whole set of new tires because they were all getting a little thread bare and being in Patagonia, we didn’t want to test our luck.
And of course, a big box of tools is essential, not just to overland expeditions, but to life in general. I’ve listed what we brought along in our gear list section.
Well, that pretty much covers it. It really is incredible how an ordinary vehicle can be turned into an overland expedition monster, with fairly little effort, and the Golden Boy, now Golden Gringo, was the best we could have asked for. Hopefully some of the modifications we did will give you an idea or two for your own truck if you are headed South. In the end though, any vehicle will do- for a truly barebones set-up, take a look at what kind of cars participate in the Mongol Rally– so don’t get hung up on finding or outfitting the perfect candidate. If that’s the only thing holding you back, just borrow your mom’s car and go. Or even ride your bike. Or walk. It doesn’t matter, just go.
I will say though, that on the other end of the spectrum from walking, there is a glorious and awe inspiring thing called the perfect expedition vehicle. It takes time, and money, and planning, and a fair bit of obsessiveness bordering on a disorder, but if you have all that you can end up with something like Nacho, from drivenachodrive.com (Careful, I am pretty sure this is classified as “expedition porn”), which I would happily move into and make my home, um, well, forever (Golden Gringo- ear muffs!).
Here are some photos of the modifications described above, which were hurriedly taken just minutes before we tried to sell the Golden Gringo down the river- luckily for him (and for us) there was a linguistic negotiation disaster, and the sale never happened. I don’t think I ever could have forgiven myself if it had…
Keep in mind that these photos were shot right after a frantic dash to remove all of our worldly possessions from the truck, and we didn’t have time to clean up the 10 months of accumulated dust and grime that inevitably coated everything in our living-on-the-road existence. I guess what I am asking is to not think we are dirty travelers as might be hinted at by the photos – you can only get an expedition vehicle so clean, especially when you are still on the expedition! A few weeks later, when we handed over the keys at the shipping port in Buenos Aires, you would have found a measurably cleaner and much more presentable Golden Gringo.
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