Bed comfort, Storage options & TV/Radio products !

[colshandy]

Hi,

Nice to meet you all!! This is a long one

Bought my first Bongo 3 weeks ago, chuffed to bits with it. Had a one night overnighter the day I got it in a car park in Stonehaven, and last weekend had 2 nights at the great Mintlaw Eden Country Park Site.

It is/will be used for mainly weekends away with myself and 2 kids (7&8y.o.) but will try to get a week or so touring around a few places this summer. Camp sites and when I am more confident in the current starting issues I have with it some wild camping.

It has a side conversion with back seats and box seats used as downstairs bed. I maybe just need to man up as the kids slept fine every night but I am not finding either beds very comfy at all. Any tips on making either bed more comfy. I found the box seat moved back during the night so there was a gap but can’t think of a handy way of fixing it in position for the bed set up. Upstairs the mattress is really thin, wondered if there were any options for beefing up the mat a bit. Any help appreciated on this topic.

Think we took far too much stuff for the weekend trip but guessing I am going to need extra storage. I can get stuff in the boot but then can’t use the fold away table. An alternative is to keep stuff in the front passenger seat but thinking an external luggage carrier thing might be required. Will give it a few more runs as is before taking the plunge but wondered what the options are. Roof mounted? Something off the back? Also need a good rack for our 3 bikes that is Bongo compatible.

Can anything be left in the roof sleeping (bedding flattened) before lowering roof?

Are there any good, (cheap!) slim bedding options on the market as our 3 sleeping bags seem to take up a heap of room?

TV/Radio - Don’t watch much but always good way of keeping kids still for a minute. Any good products on the market. Anything which could store movies on and be used with said "TV?"

On our fist night I stupidly flattened the leisure battery running the fridge. What is battery man enough for? How do the solar panels I have heard about improve things?

And a few random ones; I have a flip back bit behind the front passenger seat. What is this for ? Any good clothes drying options/lines? And any tips on cleaning the mildew from inside the tent bit of the roof?

Now I've typed this out thinking I should have posted them as separate threads...

Cheers

Colin

[levon]

Hi and welcome.

Ours is unconverted so can't answer many of the queries.

The flip up bit behind the passengers seat is a seat, push passenger seat forward, flip the flip up bit over and you have a perch for sitting on.

As for bedding, lots of options, do a search on here and there are lots of posts on the issue (both upstairs and downstairs). Personally we use a thermarest and karrimoor mat which makes it comfortable enough while still packing down fairly small, lots of people use a blow up matress downstairs.

Happy camping

[PisceanJoy]

Mine is unconverted and I sleep downstairs
There is only me
i put a single futon mattress to cover bumps
Then i have a 2.5 inch foam mattress
very comfy
I store the foam mattress when I lower roof

[bongo frenzee]

We make a washing line Scout n Guide stylee using 2 tent porch/awning poles (the sort with a thin peg or pin at one end), 5 guy lines and 4 pegs:

1) Assemble poles and attach 2 guy lines to top of one pole.
2) Ask someone to hold the pole upright while you peg out the guy lines at 90 degrees to each other (10 o clock & 2 o clock positions)
3) attach a third guy line to the top of the pole and pull it taut, away from the guy lines you just pegged out (in the direction of 6 o clock)
4) Attach the other end of this guy line to the top of the second pole. Your assistant can let go of the first pole and now hold the second one.
5) Attach 2 more guy lines to the top of the second pole, and peg these out in the same way as the first two (4 o clock and 8 o clock positions).
6) Tighten everything up and hang out yer 'smalls'!

It's ok for light items eg swimming gear and light towels, but would struggle with heavier/very wet ones.

Bike rack - lots of us use the Thule 973 and Muz has some great photos showing how to attach it without removing the spoiler.

We use an iPad for films etc in the Bongo if it's too wet to sit out.

Can't help with the bedding issue as we have a rock n roll bed so we use a normal duvet and pillows and store them underneath the bed.

Happy Bongoing!