Colorful language flows from the fingertips, as it does from the lips of this spouse-made farm girl, but in this crazy life we all need some colorful discussion to distract us from our own, everyday craziness! In here, we do DIY, farm life, and a lot more!
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20 Must-Have Items for Your Camper
More than 20 years ago, we started out on our camping journey in a tent, but after the accident that Farm Boy is so well known for in my posts (motorcycle, 0 vs. truck, 1), we quickly upgraded to a small toy hauler – no slideouts or frills, just the basics. After a few years, our kids grew into adult-sized humans, and once again, we upgraded. I call the upgrade the Vacation Home – a 44′ fifth-wheel toy hauler with 2 slideouts, a king bedroom in the front, 2 bathrooms, and 2 electronic queen beds in the garage. It was heaven on wheels! Well, as we all know, kids grow up – they moved out or became busy with jobs or significant others, and Farm Boy and I found ourselves in a big ol’ glamper all by ourselves. What did we do next? We downsized, that’s what we did – right back to another small toy hauler with a queen bedroom in the front and an electronic queen bed in the back. This little guy is just big enough to haul the two of us and our Can Am Spyder. So far, we love it!
Whether you’re restocking a camper or glamper, or starting fresh with a new RV, some items are absolute, non-negotiables! It doesn’t matter how big the camper is, or how many people travel with you, these must-haves are the items we never leave home without!
Kitchen & Dining
Just like at home, the kitchen away from home needs to be organized. When we camp, plastic utensils aren’t our go-to…have you ever tried to cut a steak with a plastic knife? Take it from us – normal, everyday flatware is the way to go. It’s nicer on the environment, too! We have these in many of our kitchen drawers where separating small items is essential. Forks, knives and spoons are organized in one drawer, while markers, pencils and other fun stuff are kept separated in another. These drawer organizers also work great for keeping hardware separated – extra screws, electrical tape, small tools, etc. A must-have for the kitchen, they also come in 6 cool colors!
Raise your hand if you tend to cook more than you know your family will eat. Yep, my hand is raised, too! This item was a “trial & error” purchase. After using zipper baggies to store leftovers, and springing a leak or two in the camper fridge, I decided to clean up baked beans juice no more! Honestly, these are a life-saver, and a mess-saver. They’re microwave-safe, which helps keep dirty dishes to a minimum and when we’re done with a camping trip, we pop ’em right in the dishwasher and squish them flat to store in the camper’s kitchen drawers. These bowls are a must-have and they’re available in awesome colors.
If you’re not a camping newbie, you’ve probably opened the camper pantry after a long trip, and felt the sting of a can of soup on your sandaled piggies (if you’re a wee youngin’, you may know them as “dogs”). Fear not! We have a remedy for this piggie (dog) abuse! We have these handled storage bins in our kitchen cabinets, bathroom vanity cabinet, and even in the fridge! I am not exaggerating, when I tell you you HAVE to get some of these! I take the covers off so they fit taller items like dish soap bottles and cans of non-stick cooking spray, but the lids make them easy to stack. Scoop up this pack of 4 before your next camping trip!
I’m a DIY fan, so I made one of these myself. If I had seen these on Amazon first, though, I’d have scooped one up real quick! Our little, 25′ toy hauler has a tiny kitchen with zero counter space. This stove cover & cutting board in one is a life-saver! Extra counter space is essential in our little camper, and this makes it easy to throw some sandwiches together or prep food for a big meal. My DIY version doesn’t double as a cutting board, nor does it have the adjustable-height legs. I may just buy one of these must-haves for myself!
This! This item just might be my favorite “trial & error” purchase. When we got tired of cleaning up dropped bottles of relish because we frequently played the game, “How Much Can I Carry to the Picnic Table in One Trip,” we decided to find a solution. Who knew a serving tray could be so useful for serving? What a concept, right?! Some folks like to transport their condiments, salads, flatware, etc. from the camper kitchen to the picnic table outside using a basket of some sort. This serving tray does the trick to make transporting all these goods to the outside dining area a breeze, and it only takes 1 trip! Unlike the baskets, this tray can be stored under other items in a cabinet, or used as a coffee station on top of your new stove cover/cutting board. I freakin’ love mine, and it brings a lot of compliments to the table.
Bed & Bath
Even a camping newbie can conclude that there’s never enough space to put your clothes in a camper bedroom (a king-sized bed doesn’t feel quite king-sized either). The Vacation Home we had was equipped with a slide-out closet and 6 really small drawers in the master bedroom – I mean, I couldn’t fit socks and undies in the same drawer for a weekend trip. The slideout closet consisted of a hanging bar and a carpeted floor, leaving lots of space from bottom to top, that was unusable. Enter, the hanging closet organizer! Voila – a way to, not only store folded clothes or shoes, this organizer lets me organize my stuff, too! I have swimsuits on one shelf, shirts on another, shorts on a third, you get the idea. This item also made it easy to keep our 3 kids’ stuff separated, and off the camper floor! Grab this must-have ASAP!
There are all kinds of tall laundry baskets out there, but this one’s the one I prefer, and here’s why: When we spent 2 weeks in the Vacation Home at Disney’s Fort Wilderness Campground, we used this basket to transport our clothes to and from the laundry center. The plastic material made it easy to label it as ours, using just a Sharpie, and I could hose it down if I needed to. We had one that stayed in kids’ area and one that stayed in the master bedroom. While en route to a campground, this basket is sometimes used to hold anything we prefer to set up or sort out when we’re parked at the campsite. I’ve used this basket to carry groceries and blankets from the house to the camper before trips, and in reverse when we get home. We’ve found that the fabric laundry baskets to have a super limited lifespan – kids are often rough on things – but my plastic baskets/hampers are still going strong 10 years later! We like these so much that we now have a set labeled “Camper” and another set for the house.
Because they store away so easily, these collapsible bins are a must-have for the camper. We keep two on board at all times, and store them in the outside storage compartments while we’re on the road. Usually, one works great for cans and bottles, while the other holds trash – I even use clothespins to clip a trash bag to the inside, so the bin stays clean. There are collapsible trashcans made for this sole purpose, but for the price, this guy works great!
The next 2 items in the Kitchen & Bath category make it easy to hang wet towels or swimsuits, inside.
Because we have always had toy haulers, we’re blessed with garage space that doubles as a laundry drying room when the weather isn’t camping-friendly. The retractable clothesline works great for wet swimsuits or beach towels, and comes in 5 color options. It doubles as a changing room in our camper when we leave it extended across the garage and hang a shower curtain on it.
Having 2 boys and a girl makes an extra changing room a necessity. We like to use damage-free methods to attach things to our walls, and have found Command Strips to be a great alternative to screws. The shower rod, is a must-have for hanging bath towels. We mounted one above our bathroom shower, higher than head-height, and it works great – another damage-free option for drying clothes on a rainy day.
Outdoor Living
You may think these are overkill, but we use our outdoor tables more than any other item we take camping. Whether it’s the picnic table that typically comes with the campsite, or our own folding table, the surfaces are necessary and in use 24/7.
The outdoor table becomes the campsite hub. It holds the electric griddle we use for pancake breakfasts, acts as the buffet when guests come by for taco night, and holds all the meal-time necessities we don’t care to keep lugging in and out of the camper. Throw it in the back of the truck and set it up under the camper’s awning to keep things dry – a must-have for every campsite.
Grab a set of these clips while you’re buying the table, because they’re life-changing when it comes to keeping the tablecloth from blowing like a sail in the wind. We have 2 sets – one for the picnic table and one for our campsite hub.
I never thought I’d use this collapsible wagon as much as I do, until I had one! This guy will get all your stuff to the beach or pool, help bring groceries from the car to the camper, hold your tall laundry baskets during transport to and from the laundry center, and do so much more…we’ve even used it to keep drinks in when we forgot to bring a cooler! You will never go without a collapsible wagon after having one, I promise.
Here they are – the staple to outdoor living at the campsite.
Farm Boy loves his gravity chair…believe me, many a nap has been had in one of these bad boys! Ours have lasted more than 10 years, and we’ve even purchased a couple more for when we have company. They’re not super portable when you decide to visit a friend’s campsite for a s’more…
…which is why we also have these rockers packed in our outdoor storage compartments. They’re a little pricy, but worth every penny. These little camp rocking chairs also come with us on the road to sporting events – we’re big time basketball fans (well, we love to watch our daughter, anyway). The rockers are portable and easy to set up and take down.
Miscellaneous Items
Some of the first things we purchased, and made sure we transferred from one camper to the next, were a couple sets of leveling blocks. The Vacation Home was equipped with a push-button, auto-leveling system, but these babies still came in handy. They’re great for keeping the leveling feet from sinking into the ground, and are super helpful on uneven ground when your jacks only go so far…Lord knows we’ve been there a time or two. They come in a set of 10 or a set of 20. We have a set of 20, and we love that they come with their own storage bags.
We don’t always get a site with a sewer hook-up, but these are necessary just to dump at the dump station – yes, most campgrounds have a spot designated for dumping your black water (poo) and gray water (shower/sink) tanks. For the Vacation Home, with 2 bathrooms, we purchased the double hose kit and the “Y” splitter to make sure the two bathrooms could hook up to 1 sewer port.
The containers were another “trial & error” purchase. Dealing with sewer hoses isn’t exactly a mess-free operation, thus the “error” part. These containers stack nicely and fit well in the camper’s outside storage compartments. We have one for the sewer hoses and their connectors, and one to hold the waterline hoses – basically a clean one and a dirty one. There are companies out there that make storage bags for all of these hoses, but we found that cleaning out the plastic bins is much easier than cleaning out a bag, not to mention, the plastic bins are much less likely to leak. The extra bins that come with this set are just a bonus…there’s always a reason to have an extra storage bin on hand!
As mentioned previously, a waterline hose is something every camper needs. Though you won’t need a new one every year, we’ve found that we need to replace ours at least every few seasons. Kinks can lead to cracks and leaks, and some just break down. We also keep more than one on hand in the event the campsite’s water spout is further away than we expected – this happens more often than you’d think. Most campers don’t come with waterline hoses, so this item is another must-have!
Adventure Awaits
Well, there you have it – our list of the 20 items we won’t ever be without on a camping trip. These items should last several years, making it worth the money to add them to your New Camper Stock-up list. The key to having a great time year after year, is being organized while making sure you work smarter, not harder. Our camping trips aren’t without the occasional blunders, but we always know where the band-aids are and no one ever worries about their bath towel blowing into the neighbor’s campfire. Yikes! Have a great time exploring and don’t forget to like us, follow us, and all that other fun stuff!