We’ve all heard the expression ‘all the gear & no idea!’, we want to make sure that you don’t end up being that guy at your favourite campsite.

To maximise your time relaxing at camp and avoid any confusion we’ve put together a handful of our best tips from the pro’s to get the most out of your Adventure Kings camping gear.

1. A warm shower in the middle of nowhere!

When you have been off the beaten path for a few days, things start to pong. A combination of bad body odour, sweat, dirt, grease and campfire smoke can make the long drive home, a sting on the nose!

To make sure you don’t make the fuel station attendants nose hairs curl, or women and children run in fear at your wafting stench, nothing beats a shower before you head home.

The Adventure Kings 12V shower simply plugs into your cigarette lighter socket to provide adjustable high pressure water from any source of water. With up to 4L/minute flow rate you can definitely wash off the layers of filth often accumulated from a few days on the tracks.

To make this experience a little more pleasurable, particularly in the colder months, our pro-tip is to heat up your water before you shower. Boiling up a billy (kettle) and slowly adding it to your water jerrycan till you get the desired temperature is the smartest and easiest way to have a nice warm rinse in the middle of nowhere. Just make sure you test the water first like you would a bath so nobody gets burnt!

Try this one out next time you hit the tracks and your loved ones will be grateful when you walk through the door when you get home!

2. Solar power efficiency enhancers.

There are millions of solar panels in use all across Australia and the rest of the world. In our opinion a good quality solar panel system is one of the cheapest and most cost effective ways to keep your campsite powered up, and coupled with a dual battery system gives you nearly limitless solar charging potential.

But not all solar power is created equal.

Some solar panels don’t include a solar voltage regulator, this can be potentially damaging for your battery system. Solar voltage varies depending on the light hitting the panel, with moving clouds, and can dip as low as 0 volts and depending on the panel as high as 22 volts a voltage regulator will maintain a steady voltage and make sure your battery is kept at its optimum health.

A good quality PWM regulator will get you most of the way, coming as standard equipment on many Adventure Kings solar panels, it will keep your batteries topped up safe and sound but when you compare the performance to the smarter MPPT solar regulators, you may feel like your system could do with an upgrade, getting up to 30% more power in certain conditions an MPPT regulator monitors your battery health more closely and manages the solar output to optimise charge.

The easiest way to get more power from your solar panels is to point them directly at the sun. This allows the panel to soak up 100% of the sun’s rays and ensures maximum performance!

3. Double your space

More people are installing 4wd awnings than ever before, they are fast becoming a more essential 4WD upgrade than the trusty old lift kit.

More than ever before families and friends are taking their vehicles on the beach and away for summer escapes, and these clever awnings are fast and easy to setup and allow people to relax in the shade.

Adventure Kings awnings come with a UPF50+ rating meaning they block more than 96% of the sun’s harmful rays.

Easy to setup, it’s also very easy to forget to tie down your awning, particularly if you are on soft sand and normal pegs don’t work. This difficulty means many people have unfortunate incidents when their awnings catch the cool summer breeze. This is why we always use a set of Adventure Kings Sand Bags to hold our awnings down on the beach! They cost less than some 6 packs and will save you a stack of drama!

4. More comfort at night!

The  Adventure Kings Big Daddy Deluxe Double Swag is Australia’s most popular swag, it is jam packed with features usually reserved for swags up to 3 times the price!

All Adventure Kings Big Daddy Deluxe Swags include a plush and comfortable 70mm mattress which is superb when comparing your swag to some other swags on the market.

This pro tip will help you to get an EVEN better night’s sleep when you hit the tracks:, The Adventure Kings queen-sized self-inflating mattress fits perfectly inside the Kings Big Daddy and Big Daddy Deluxe swags. This means you can add an additional 100mm of supa comfortable padding between you and the cold rocky ground at night. Some people choose to replace the standard mattress, whilst others simply add the self-inflating mattress for maximum cushioning.

With that tip you wont ever want to go home to your normal bed!

From years of experience camping in the bush, these tips are just the beginning to excellent nights away, on the tracks, with the family or even on big road trips – keep any eye peeled for more articles about how to get the most out of your camping setup!