Installing a Rhino Rack & a HITents Roof Tent on Our FJ Cruiser Project
On Top of the World
At its most basic level, camping is surviving; a chance to demonstrate a connectedness with our primitive roots and endure in nature. While waking up to the pink and orange hues of a sunrise over the desert scape or falling asleep beneath the twinkle of alpine stars can be a divine, soul-mending experience—especially in today's whizzbang, electronically bound world—it's a lot more fun with a little bit of comfort and convenience. After all, when was the last time you started a campfire by rubbing two sticks together?
Like a fine wine to a good steak, the right gear has the ability to maximize any camping experience. And while the rabbit hole of trick gear runs Alice-in-Wonderland deep, one of the most important decisions to make is where you'll be sleeping each night while in the wilderness.
A bedroll and a dome tent have served us well for years, but since we were building our FJ Cruiser for overlanding, which often means long days of driving and daily campsite relocation, we turned to HITents in Buellton, California, for a rooftop tent and to Rhino-Rack for a rack to mount it on. This style of tent has taken the off-road community by storm. It, along with the mandatory Hi-Lift jack, have become the tattoo of the overlanding movement.
HITents sent us an example of its Expedition Grade Jalama tent and awning package, and we set to work mounting on the newly affixed Rhino Rack. The install was extremely simple for both, as detailed in the captions, with the hardest part being the act of lifting the tent onto the rack—it's not light. The tent isn't the wispy nylon fabric us groundlings are used to. It's a meaty 400g canvas that has an actual substance to it.
"When you buy a tent, you're paying for canvas, hinges, and poles," says HITents owner Graham Holloway. "That's really the difference between everything on the market, and it's what makes them last."
The Jalama uses aluminum poles for the tent body, aluminum hinges, and steel poles for the window supports. They include a 12-volt LED strip (powered off the truck) to light the tent in the evening hours, but other accessories were intentionally omitted. "We're not offering USB charging ports," says Holloway. "Camping, for us, is getting away from all of that."
