Element
While not a vehicle one could live in, our Honda Element EX AWD AT at least deserves an honorable mention. This was the first vehicle that we took a long trip in and got us thinking we might want something more. We never gave her/him a name, but she served us well. And she was Tangerine! What was there to not love?
We bought the Element because of the interior materials and fabric - durable and perfect for a German Shepherd, Mina in our case. It was such a great dog car that they later released a version that came with a dog ramp and a built in watering bowl.
Anyway, when Ann received an extra week’s vacation in 2014 and we decided to spend it all in Yellowstone and Grant Teton National Parks (changing plans from a 2-week Yosemite trip, which happened to be good fortune because that was the year of the big fires), we had to figure out how to afford such a long vacation. The obvious answer was camping. Then we had to figure out how to do that with the Honda.
We wound up using the hitch we had installed at the time of purchase and carrying a bunch of stuff on a platform hitched onto the rear of the vehicle. As you can see, we managed to pack quite a bit in that little car.
The reason we could should be pretty obvious from the picture below - the inside was huge when you lifted up the rear seats. Even more so when you removed them altogether, as we did for the Yellowstone trip.
Other times, we would just raise the seats and pack away. Plenty of space for a weekend jaunt out to the Painted Hills, for example.
The Element had all wheel drive, which helped us on tracks. And don’t let her small size fool you, she was tough enough to stand up to pretty much anything we threw at her. Even the periodic Bison.
She really did serve us well, but she had her limitations. The 2015 Utah trip where we rented an RV with our friends Gary and Paula made us realize the advantages of having a vehicle you could live in, which set us on the course for Beast.
But we shouldn’t forget where it all started and who made that first long photography trip possible. Our Tangerine Honda Element!