When you’re traveling in such a tight space your storage game needs to be on point. To be honest I felt really overwhelmed when we first packed our van and my first instinct was to just throw our crap in the cupboards (or on the floor as seen in the picture below) and hope for the best. But then I got myself together and started playing with different ideas of were to put our goods. Thankfully since we’ve taken quite a few trip now, we’ve got it down to a science. The biggest change we made was to stop over packing food for the kids (I will do another helpful post on to for a family). There’s grocery stores everywhere so even if you forget an ingredient for your next culinary camping masterpiece or you just used your last diaper because your kid just had a blow out you’ll be fine I promise (well don’t hold me to that).
Interior Storage
We have dedicated most of the interior cabinets for food storage. When you travel with kids they are always hungry so I like to be able to pop open the cabinets when we’re on the road and easily access what they whining about which is usually a granola bar or beef jerky. I also find it nice to keep canned goods, rices and most importantly Tequila at the ready and these baskets really fit well in the space. Food Storage containers are a big help as well. I recommend putting cereal, chips and cracker’s in air tight containers, this way your cereal will always be crunchy and you wont have smashed up chips and crackers (which is a big pet peeve of mine).
For our toiletries and laundry stuff (I’m obsessed with doing laundry every 3-4 days since we can only pack so much) we use the same basket size as our food storage. Soap, lotions and Rons hanging mesh toiletry bag in the cabinet where the Halo Shower system is located. We needed to use a slimmer basket that would fit random shower essentials.
Storage Benches
My favorite addition was the custom benches we had installed from Canyon Adventure Vans. This has really been a saving grace for our storage needs (it also doubles as more seating for long trips or just hanging around your campsite). We put our clothing under one bench seat and depending on the season kids skis and ski boots or folding chairs and random things in the spring and summer under the other bench. These seats also leave room in the middle so you can still utilize the space for taller items such as your dirt bike, trail bike, snow board bag, or even your great dane.
Incognito Storage
A good space to keep your cleaning/ dish supplies is in the sink! These items you’ll always need access to so it’s nice to be able to open the sink and voila your supplies are at the ready. I usually keep these items on the counter when we’re camping/Boondocking so it made sense for us. Also, since we’re still in a pandemic I always like to have my disinfecting wipes ready for when we have to go in and out of stores/gas stations.
Exterior Storage
We use 4 Front Runner wolf pack storage bins 2 of which carry power cables, water and sewage hoses, the other 2 storage bins we keep dry items in their Typhoon Bag. We chose to go with Front Runner because they are so affordable and versatile.
