The video above is highlighting the discussion about the glovebox, which is worth your time, but I wanted to pull out the conversation about sleeping in vehicles because, it’s true, that people are obsessed with this concept.
Back at the old lighting site it was almost a game to see who could spend the most nights sleeping in a van or a car (or make other people do it). I once made Patrick George and Travis Okulski sleep with me in a Sprinter Crew van and it would have been fine if it didn’t drop to 18F overnight. Oh well! This came up because we saw pics last week of the Ford Transit Trail, which looks to be an attempt at muscling in on the ProMaster and Sprinter in the #vanlife market. The van looks comfortable and we’ll have a lot more information on it as we get closer to the review. It’s worth listening to for one of my favorite stories about David falling asleep in a Postal Jeep while trying to drive cross-country, but what I’m curious about is something David said about sleeping in his Toyota’s Landcruiser. David says that the rear cargo area is too small to sleep in so you need to remove the second seat in order to sleep. Or! You can just sleep in the second row. Here’s a pic of a Landcruiser second row from one that was listed on Cars and Bids.
Actually, that looks pretty comfortable. Even the New York Times is getting in on this, with a story about taking an overnight luxury bus from Washington, D.C. to Nashville, TN. Obviously, sleeping in a car is a choice some people have to make because they’re in a dire economic situation. That’s terrible and I think it’s a concept in the back of our minds all the time, that we could end up living in our vehicle, and so we want to read about it and think about it to know that it’s possible. To listen to the podcasts episodes you can go to Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or you can use the RSS feed and point your favorite Podcast player at it. I’m embedding the three most recent episodes below if you want to listen to it from your browser. Please like, subscribe, rate, et cetera.
I have ALSO slept in the back of my Chevy S10 Blazer, putting down the back seats and using a folding mattress from L.L. Bean. I was working as an instructor at an Outward Bounds school in Maine. In between courses I’d go climbing, go sailing, go just hiking, and go driving all over the Northeast and into Canada (back when that was easier than stopping at the gas station). I felt like a king. A brief review: My F-150 was excellent if the weather was nice and cool (no AC), although I did have to scrunch up my legs a tiny amount. My wife’s CX-5 is pretty good, lean the seat back about 45 degrees, open the center console (and maybe put a pillow underneath your leg,) throw your right leg over the console, let your left leg sprawl underneath the pedals wherever fits. For me a pillow helped prevent my head from lolling back between the space that opens up between the rear window and the headrest when the seat is reclined A Charger is damn near splendid for sleeping in. Nothing you need to do but crank the AC. Volvo S60 hybrid was almost too comfortable. The passenger seat slides so far back that my feet can’t even touch the firewall, and I’m a big boy at 6’1″. Lay the seat back after that, turn on the AC and you better hope you set an alarm for when your lunch break ends. I’ve yet to check out the Miata, but one of the things that my FSAE team’s drivers always said was “if its comfortable enough to sleep in, its a good seating position.” and the Miata has a damn fine seating position. With the weather cooling down here in Florida, it might be worth trying out one day during lunch. On the way home from work that day I was driving into a blinding setting sun. Instinctively, I reached up and pulled down the sun visor (sun shade?). Instantly, I had a panicky thought that what if some brainiac software engineer wanted to put a motor on this visor and make me open a screen and push a “button” to automatically lower that visor? I certainly would’ve scorched my retinas, crashed, died and been unable to contribute with this rant on the varied inane, insane, and asinine things that are automated in cars these days. Anyway, thanks for reading this since I’m still alive to write it. In the Prius, I’d fold down the back seat, push forward a front seat to make it long enough (for 5’10” person), and have an extra duffel bag filled with stuff in the footwell of the backseat to fill that gap. I’m sure that there are a number of other hybrids with enough room to lie down flat inside could pull the same overnight climate control trick. EVs can do it too, though they are not as good for road trips across North America due to the charging network. “Tesla Bjorn” on youtube would sleep in his Model S in Norwegian winter. The Model S is actually a liftback with room to sleep two comfortably. My last cross country trip was in the newer of my two Subaru Legacy wagons (Prius was totaled in caribou collision), which is decent enough for sleeping, but doesn’t have the climate control. Anyway as somewhat of a minimalist, I don’t envy the cartop tents, camper trailers, or vanlife vans. If you aren’t bringing a ton of stuff, camping/sleeping in the right car can give you a great night’s sleep. #metoo That soured my tenting experience for the rest of the weekend and my thought was “I’ll just sleep in my car. How bad could it be?” Pretty bad, when you’re a 6’3″ dude and your means of transport is a 2016 Chevy Cruze (sedan, not hatchback). There’s not a large, flat space to stretch out or even curl up. Instead, you adjust the front seat as far back as it’ll go and make the best of it. Legroom is damn near nonexistent. The windows kept fogging up and air kept getting stale in the small space, so I periodically had to open the windows even though it was freezing out. Oh, and I’d locked the doors from the inside (for security, obviously) only to somehow trigger the car alarm at 4 a.m. when I thoughtlessly opened one to use the restroom, waking up the entire campground. That was fun. Thus began my quest to obtain a pull behind camper. If I never have to sleep in a vehicle again, I’ll die happy.
