This gate was open when I went through it an hour ago 

Reign Outdoor has made some tweaks to their awning design (based in part on my feedback) and I will be testing the new version here very soon. They had an immediate need for my old awning elsewhere, so I had to take it off off and ship it some weeks before the new one was ready. I'm expecting the updated awning to arrive tomorrow and I will be posting a video about it ASAP. I was entirely happy with everything about the awning, except for one detail: the original outer cover was a little undersized and it could be a bit of a struggle to pack away, especially if it was cold/wet/snowy/icy. The new version has a slightly larger cover, and they've also made a few other tweaks. Outer cover aside, I've been very satisfied with the awning itself, it checks all the boxes I had when I was shopping for a 270. Review of the new version coming soon!

THANK YOU@@softroadingthewest

My son started carrying a nice pair of heavy duty bolt cutters. He won’t cut a lock to get in but if someone comes behind him and locks a gate then game on. I’ll add he ensures the land isn’t private, not posted keep out or anything similar.

sounds like unsolicited advice. weird

Ha, that's awesome!

Worked in the Canadian oil fields for years and we always kept bolt cutters and extra padlocks in the truck. Cut the chain, add your own lock Not sure if that would work with forestry though 🙂.

​@@benson098123Good idea. Today a 20volt cordless grinder would be a must.

Haha, I probably would've let that go, but I filmed this adventure just a few days after that snow adventure dropped, so the comment was fresh in my mind. I don't take any of it too seriously, but I still get surprised by what people find to gripe about. Obviously I'm far from perfect, make mistakes, and I'm always open to constructive criticism, but in this case it felt undeserved. 😄

@softroadingthewest "Some people's kids", as the saying goes. Keep the adventure going. 🙂

​@@softroadingthewest The ones that got me were the responses after your refillable propane cylinder video. Some of those had me shaking my head, and at least one had me going are you freaking kidding me!?!? Well done in both cases, sir.

Hey. You gotta give the guy credit. He actually handled big wood on camera and didn't flinch. Would have been more epic with a slo-mo shot of heroically picking up the log on his shoulder and flinging it aside, though. Just sayin'... 🤣

@@sagebrushbob2321 Haha, that's very true, Bob. I was extremely impressed with the unwavering might with which he used to move that big wood, but I am not sure we want to watch him toss big wood in slow-mo🤣.

Didn't want to "pull a Jason."🤣

😂😂😂

@@PrimalOutdoors Now that's some funny shit right there!

You got locked in! Oh Man, that must have been a real PIA! I have had trees fall in the road behind me and block my way out, but they’re pretty ez to get out of the way.

When we're scouting on dirt bikes you used to be able to push them under, then they put bars under the bars to keep you from doing that. Then we'd heft them over the gates, after which they started putting a bar over the bar to keep you from doing that. They used to be so tall that the quads would just air down and squeeze their rides under - not really any more.

That's a pretty big drone. Do you need a special license/permit for that?

It's hard to tell in the video, but after cutting it, that trunk ended up teetering on the ledge to the side of the road...it was just luck that it happened to be almost perfectly balanced, which made it relatively easy to pivot. I found a log weight calculator and estimated that thing weighed probably around 1,600 pounds...no way I could move that normally; I figured I'd have to use the winch to get it out of the way. Just got lucky it was so well balanced on that ledge. :-)

Yeah there are still a LOT of roads that remain closed and look pretty unlikely to ever get reopened. Between the Holiday Farm and Cedar Creek fires, the extent of the devastation is mind-blowing.

Haha, well it was very luckily teetering on the edge of that dropoff, I would never have been able to move it without the winch otherwise, it must've weighed a thousand pounds.

Ha, so I actually found a log weight calculator, and based on my estimate for thickness and length, and assuming it's Douglas fir, the calculator came to around 1,400 pounds.

@@softroadingthewest woah !

Trap, that's a perfect word for it. Absolutely my least favorite conditions to drive in.

I cover that in the "Kitchen" installment of my camper build series: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE--kPKsaRleSs.html

Thanks Donald!@@softroadingthewest

What a lazy comment. You could have spent way more time defending him! This comment should have been twice as long!

Exactly! 😄

People complaining about how you clear the road? I appreciate any effort especially on a thick tree. Keep the trail tight it’ll help keep the riff raff from getting stuck in the snow, hoping someone will rescue them

I did not know that...very interesting! There have been a number of times when a little more length would have been nice to have. Usually I just don't even bother if the tree is larger than my saw, but I was unusually motivated this time to just get to that campsite in the sun and be done for the day. 😆I'll have to check, but pretty sure it would still fit in my bumper toolbox where I carry this. That seems like a nice upgrade for sure. Thanks!

Fucking truer words. Followed closely by land of open gates but you still aren’t supposed to be in the area 😂😂

It's sad. A lot of that has to do with people disrespecting the land. When I bought my house there was one gate, didn't really lead anywhere. Now there is another gate, and those dirt roads roads would lead out to two different valleys/areas. I used to love just driving out there and looping around back to my place. But no, it's turned into a dump site.

@@originalname9999dump sites for sure. BLM roads close to town are really bad for dumping! So irritating to see trash in the woods!

Haha, I was perfectly happy with my cowboy coffee, then one morning someone made me coffee in a French press and it reminded me what superb coffee that method produces, so I decided to experiment with it. Cleanup is slightly more involved, but on the flip side, I like that I just bring the water to a boil once and don't have to tend to that second simmer (which would often get away from me as I would be trying to film and I'd have yet another boilover to clean up 😆). This Stanley cup has far better insulation than the insulated travel cup I had been using and keeps my coffee truly hot for hours, so I have come to appreciate it. When I was a kid, my dad would take a Stanley thermos of coffee to work every morning, or bring it with us on fishing/hunting trips, and it had this same pebbly green finish, so this cup brings a certain pleasant nostalgia to my mornings as well. 😄 And yes...the day's unexpected twists made this into a fun trip for sure. Thanks George!

@@softroadingthewest here is a camp tip that I started a couple years ago. After dinner I put my coffee pot full of water on the stove to warm up while I eat dinner. After dinner I bring the water up to a boil. This gives me hot water for dish clean up and I fill a Stanley 32oz thermos bottle. What ever may be left gets poured back into my fresh water stores. Next morning I have nice hot water to make my coffee with. No need to wait for boiling water in the morning to make coffee with. Often this saves on fuel since you don't have to raise the water temp as much at night than you do in the morning. Plus you don't have to wait for coffee! 32oz also gives us enough for more than 1cup of coffee, but also is enough to make instant oatmeal with too. If we do oatmeal we don't even have to fire up the stove in the morning for breakfast saving even more fuel and time.

LOL...that sounds like someone I know 😂

🤣

Yeah maybe one day. Honestly merch generally hasn't been worth the time involved & upfront investment required, but I don't mind the stickers because it doesn't cost a ton to have a batch printed and they ship easily in a standard envelope with a letter-rate stamp. I'll keep patches in mind though!

Absolutely, they were all manageable complications and ultimately it made for a fun trip. 🙂

For sure. I went out fully planning on a serene, uneventful overnighter but this truly became a more interesting trip with all the unexpected twists...I had a smile on my face all the way home. 🙂

I've loved my ScanGauge III, it does exactly what it's supposed to do and the ability to scan CEL codes has been a godsend. It did suddenly stop working a couple of months ago, perhaps just a connection issue (I never really ran the cable that well or properly secured it). At the time it was rainy for weeks on end and I didn't feel like messing with it (I have no shelter for my truck). When I get some time and a nice day I'll fiddle with it. I get enough questions about it that I should probably make a video. 😏

@@softroadingthewest I for one would love to see a video on the Scan Gauge.

That's good to know. I've had such good luck with this NOT running into things (including sometimes stopping short in places it _could_ pass through but decides are too close for comfort 😆) that perhaps I've grown a little overconfident in its abilities. Here you can see it did pull up when it veered towards the trees, but then after a pause, decided to proceed forward anyway, which surprised me since at that point, it could no longer see me anyway. The one thing I've found with the ActiveTrack (at least, my now relatively old vintage of it) is that it loses me pretty easily whenever there's visual interference and just stops. So there were a number of things here that caught me by surprise. When I bought this drone a couple years ago, I also looked pretty hard at the Skydio 2. I have a friend with one of those and its tracking/self-flying is insane. Having a long history of crashing the little DJI Spark I was flying before, it seemed like a good idea, but so many reviews talked about the superiority of the DJI for everything else (which is the bulk of how I use it) I ultimately opted for a used Mavic 2 Pro off eBay. I can't justify the expense of two drones in my kit, but man I wouldn't mind being able to put the Skydio up for driving shots. 😄

@@softroadingthewest Ive taught lineman out in CA using the skydio and it too has a tough time seeing thin branches or power lines. It does have a good active track though but you sacrifice the camera, it isnt the best at least on the 2/2+. DJI still has the best cameras. The Mini 4 pro is good and so is the mini 3 pro. 4 pro has 360 obstacle avoidance where as the mini 3 pro just in the forward and aft. I personally have mini 3 pro and it works well. Hope that info helps.

Hi David, I have the "medium" Snowpeak fire pit. It's still quite small...Snowpeak's "small" is teeny tiny. 🙂

Really nice spot for sure. Would be a real pleasure in the heat of summer with all that shade and a nice little beach there.

At softroadingthewest.com, in the upper right there is a link that says "STICKERS" but here is a direct link, if RU-vid will allow it: softroadingthewest.com/store

thank you I just ordered them@@softroadingthewest

@@thomasreilly4156 Received, I've just packaged that up. Should make today's mail. Thank you!

In my case the Mesa (wedge) version was the only option. I have their prototype for Frontier and at that time, it was Mesa or nothing. 🙂 But if I were to do it over and make a purchase with both options available, I personally would still opt for the Mesa: • The deploy and break-down operations are simpler with fewer moving parts; • It seems more able to comfortably withstand the strong winds that somehow frequently find me 😄(and I like that I can point the truck into the wind and have that metal roof take the brunt of it); • When the bed is stowed and I'm on my feet moving around in the camper, there is as much (actually more) headroom as the Badlander; • The Mesa is quite a bit less expensive and - for the way I use my camper - it wouldn't be worth the extra thousands to have the far end of the bed also popped up, since it's just my feet down there and there is ample headroom at the head of the bed. On the flip side, some advantages of the Badlander: • It just _feels_ more spacious and airy inside • You can opt to sleep with your head towards the front of the truck rather than sleeping with your head at the "downstairs" opening - which also means you could sit up in bed with your back against the tent wall to read, something you can't do in the Mesa. • If you have (or eventually plan to have) two people sleeping upstairs, I think it would be more comfortable and less constrictive to have an elevated roof over the entire bed and to not have your heads at the opening where you also climb up/down. If there are two of you, I would highly recommend somehow mocking up both scenarios to make sure it's going to be comfortable and practical. If I had a girlfriend/spouse who was regularly camping with me, I think the additional cost of the full pop-up roof would very quickly prove to be a worthwhile investment (but that's just me speculating as I haven't had opportunity to try either way 😭😂).

@@softroadingthewest Thank you so much for the detailed review. You’ve really been a help. Much success on your videos.

I talk about it in the Kitchen installment of my camper build series, about 3 minutes in: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE--kPKsaRleSs.html I got the burner at my local propane shop, but you can find similar on Amazon, there's a link both in the description of this video as well as the kitchen video.

Haha, oh no. I'm not that strong. It might be hard to see in the video, but the log very luckily ended up teetering on the edge of the dropoff pretty much right at its center point, so half the weight was hanging off the edge and elevating my end. Just physics and luck, haha.

Exactly!

That's covered in the "kitchen" installment of my camper build series: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE--kPKsaRleSs.html

1000% worth it. It just goes and goes and goes.

Yes, I believe he has a video about making it.

Yes. Ended up being super simple. I cover it in the "kitchen" episode of the camper build series: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE--kPKsaRleSs.html

😁

Omigosh I LOVE this thing. I've had it for 5 years now. It works fantastically, just chews through whatever I throw it at, and seems to run forever on a single charge of the battery. It's lightweight and easy to handle. It uses a standard Oregon chain so I can walk into just about any home improvement store and get a new chain for it. I don't have to carry a separate fuel-oil-mix can for it, and never have to worry about a finicky carburetor or getting it started at elevation. I carry a charger in the truck at all times, so if I ever got into a situation where I absolutely had to cut and cut and cut in order to extract myself, I could. On these trips it mostly gets used for collecting campfire wood - which is also nice - but it's been awesome to be able to clear roads. And it's proven useful at home, especially when I end up with storm damage to my trees. The 12" bar on mine is good enough most of the time, though if one had room to carry a longer saw, it would certainly be nice to have a few more inches at times. Overall though, 1000% worth it to me.