Review: Glacier's Edge Self Inflating Camp Sleeping Pad & Pillow

Update 6/10/15: The sleeping pad began losing air after 2 or 3 nights usage. Too bad I bought it so long ago, there is no returning it now.


I stopped by Fred Meyer today to pick up a 14 gallon Rubbermaid Roughneck plastic tote ($9+tax) and nothing else really, I decided to wander down the camping isle since it was nearby. (Well, that's sort of a lie since I went near across the store after finding the tote in the Xmas area on the side of the store I entered).

I walked out having spent just under $44 for my 14 gallon tote, an 18 gallon tote plus some new tent camping gear that was on sale for 40% off, a Glacier's Edge Self Inflating Sleep Pad ($18 on sale) and the Glacier's Edge Self Inflating Pillow ($6 on sale).

As they come from the store:

I had my doubts since I once tried out a $40 Coleman one back in 2009 and I found it to be unusable it was so lacking in padding and was very lumpy. A cheap pool mat is more comfortable to me. I returned it within a few days having only tested it at home. But I figured hey, the way these are packaged, they aren't sealed up with anything other than the storage sacks. I figured I'd bring them out and test them out for comfort since I can always return them... the same way I did the lumpy, lousy Coleman one (which came in a box, no bag with it.)

Sleeping pad first removed from the bag. It has built-in straps in addition to the bag.

I am pleasantly surprised by the camping pad. It self inflates most of the way easily.

Partly inflated, without help from me.

It's not a bad idea to help it out by closing the valve and rolling it up from the valve end to push the air to the opposite end then opening the valve again. Do this a 1-2 more times and it will be very well inflated.

The fully inflated size (according to the bag) is: 72" L x 20" W x 1.5" D

It is quite comfortable for me, but I'm only about 155lbs, so I don't know how well it will perform for huskier people. Initially I was trying it on the carpet padded floor but then I tried it out on the hard kitchen floor. I had to give it just a light puff of air beyond the "fully self inflated" state to make it more comfortable for side sleeping on the hard floor since I could just barely feel the floor that way. Perhaps I wouldn't if I was in a sleeping bag since it would have an extra layer of padding. I usually fall asleep on my back and wake up on my side, so side sleeping comfort is important to me.

 The valve seems to be well made, sturdy and seals well:

The package says it's 1.5" thick and I guess it is, just barely, by my measurement. The material feels of good quality.

Now... the pillow? Well... it's good for what it is. You can easily adjust the firmness by letting out extra air. It's probably great for budget backpacking or very light car camping but I wouldn't want to use it more than I had to. It self inflates most of the way very quickly. I suggest putting a pillowcase or a t-shirt to put over it. It's a rather noisy/annoying being polyester/plastic, at least for me. It's acceptable for short term use, which is all it's intended for anyway.

The pillow comes with a velcro loop in addition to the bag:

Self-inflated after a minute or so without any help:

 After a couple of minutes, with help.

I don't know how well the pad and pillow will hold up long term or if they are worth buying at FULL PRICE, but for $18 and $6, I think I made a wise purchase.

Road trip next year - car or van?

The van has been winterized, tarped over (it still leaks around the bed windows *sigh*, with a 1W solar panel (paid $5 for!) plugged in for the starting battery's benefit. (The house batteries get power from the big solar panels on the roof) I considered just putting a jumper wire between the battery connectors on the battery isolator, but I figured 1W is enough to keep it topped off with zero usage. The in-dash stereo's memory runs off of the house batteries due to the custom wiring installation I did on it.

Now to the topic at hand ...

I am planning for a road trip around the middle of next year in my car since the trip will be at least 4,500 miles round trip. Even though gas prices have dropped by about $2/gal since March 2014, it would still cost a good $1400-1500 in gas round trip based on 9.5mpg average. The car gets about 30-35mpg, so figuring 32mpg average, the cost would be about $425-450. I would require campgrounds more likely unless I simply recline the car seat and sleep that way, or pitch a tent at campgrounds.

Where comfort is concerned, the van is be better but cost wise, the car wins out. But who knows? I might change my mind in the next 6 months and just pay the $1500 in gas since I want to make it a long, drawn out trip of several weeks, if not an entire month or longer.

End of the road

Well, it turns out a low income disabled apartment opened up for me last month in Tacoma WA, so I moved in this month. It was too good to pass up. A HUD subsidized good sized 1br apartment with lots of storage, 3rd floor with some of a view, elevator access, free parking (for the 1993 Geo Metro I bought last month) and still in the city. The full rent would be about $800 and I am paying about 1/3 of that with the HUD subsidy due to my income level.

The van is in storage due to laws/rules about camper vans and such. I found a relatively low priced place, $30 less than I was paying before. I have no plans to get rid of it anytime soon. I have too much in it. I doubt I could get even HALF of what I have in it. I will use it for short getaways around the northwest mostly due to it's low MPG, but who knows... I might take a long trip in it again some day.

I will either be revamping this blog into a general travel blog, or just creating a new blog and posting a link to it. I'm not sure which I'll do, yet.

Post a comment with your suggestion on which you think I should do.

In the meantime, a few photos:

 Nice bit of a view.

 My "new" car for daily driving.

Vintage Computer Faire - Seattle, WA

I went to a cool, free Vintage Computer Faire today at the Living Computer Museum in the SODO district of Seattle. Click the picture below to view my photo album on Facebook (no account needed).

Staying in Seattle for a while

The RV park I wanted to move into back in March finally got an opening, so I have decided to stay in Seattle for a while instead of hitting the road... for now anyway. Who knows how I'll feel next spring.

I had to pay a deposit for the park plus a $45 background check (ugh) plus a $200 refundable deposit. So I'm gonna be here a little while for sure. I opted for the month to month "lease" instead of the 1-year lease so I won't feel so tied down here.

I also ended up having to rent a uhaul pickup from the storage place where I had the van parked. After 5 months of being parked on a slope (engine side high), the carburetor was bone dry, and probably had an empty fuel line all the way back to the gas tank. I had to go buy a 5 gallon gas can (to be sure I had enough fuel in case some had evaporated) and also prime the carburetor a few times by pouring gasoline directly into it from a plastic cup then cranking the engine until I got it running.

The fuel pump on these beasts is mechanical, so when the engine is turning over or running, the fuel pump is running. By pouring gas into the carb directly and giving it enough fuel to run for a few seconds, it put a bit less strain on the starter.

Once I got it running, it did just fine. I drove it from Tacoma up here to Seattle about 30 miles and parked it. So yeah, I'm now back to living in it full time.

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I'm kind of just rambling on now... you can stop reading now if you want since it's just thinking out loud about possible things I might do. heh

My ultimate plan was to live up in the Seattle area in a few years but as you all know, plans seldom work out exactly as planned. I ended up taking up WA state residency and having to register my van here, so yeah.. I "live" here now.

It has crossed my mind that I should forget anymore LONG cross country trips in this ol' van. The engine is so aged with no proof of what has ever been done to it as far as repairs or maintenance. It lightly burns oil which is a sign something, somewhere in the valves is wrong. Frankly, I fear it could have a major failure (valves are my biggest fear obviously) and leave me having to pay thousands of dollars for repairs and being stranded without anywhere to live.

If it's stuck at a garage being repaired for several days, assuming I could even afford the repair (if it would even be worth doing!) I wouldn't be able to stay in it during the time it's at the shop.

The power steering pump screams bloody murder (loud screeching) when it's cold and sometimes other times when the steering is turned to the max in one direction. Low on fluid? It shouldn't be since I had a few gearbox put on last year. The new gearbox install should have required fluid being added.... I think?

Maybe I'm just being paranoid but... I don't know. I'd hate to be in the middle of Kansas with a blown engine and having to spent my savings to patch it up so I can try to get back to Washington.

I am mulling over the idea of just staying put and buying an old 3cyl automatic transmission Geo Metro. For the cost of repairing this beast (or even DRIVING it.. with it's 10mpg hwy) I can buy a Geo Metro with 31 city/35 hwy and drive 3.5x further on the same gas. I could take a month long trip around the country in it for a fraction of the cost of driving the van.

Just to put it into perspective: I was considering hitting the road in September and going back out to Arkansas to visit and pick up my other stuff. Using the following estimated formula, this is what it would cost to drive the van round trip:

4500 (round trip miles) divided by 9mpg (assuming 90% hwy, 10% city) = 500 gallons of gas (!!!!!!)
500 gallons X $3.75 (average price) = $1,875 round trip gas cost

See what I mean? Now let's to that again with a Geo Metro:

4500 (round trip miles) divided by 34mpg (assuming 90% hwy, 10% city) = 133 gallons of gas
133 gallons X $3.75 (average price) = $498.75 round trip gas cost

Less than 1/3. Driving the van would cost $1376.25 more than driving a Geo Metro. You can BUY a Geo Metro for 1376.25 at times if you find a good deal! So it's come down to this: Do I want to sink money into gasoline and have little to show for it than memories and photos... or do I want to just set down roots here, buy a high mileage used car and simply do my part time traveling in that instead?

I do hate the fact that I spent 2 years working on this motorhome and only 5 months on the road. I actually tried posting an ad on Craigslist for the van to see if anyone would respond interested in my price of $6.000, but some jackass keeps flagging my ad. It's either that or the CL spam control system is automatically flagging it due to the LONG description I was placing in it.

It has also crossed my mind to buy a big travel trailer (later on) and put it in this spot and sell the van, or at least store it elsewhere for as cheap as I can find.

But this is all just thinking out loud. I'm less than 24 hours moved into this RV park so I have plenty of time to think things over. It's going to be at least 5 years before any low income public housing comes up. When that does, the van will go back into storage since I probably won't be able to park it at the apartments. At which point, I'd be glad to have a Geo Metro for daily driving.

As much as I loved full timing on the road, it can be chore. Plus my fear of major engine failure makes me hesitant to drive it another 10,000 miles without some form of backup plan for a place to live should something go wrong. It makes me think a small travel trailer and the pickup I had would have been a better way to go since everything wouldn't be tied up in the vehicle itself... but that's long past now. I have what I have so I am just going to try to get the most enjoyment out of it for now and decide what to do long term later on.

Stay away from the forum IRV2

The admin "Clifftall" over at IRV2 make up rules as he goes along. He claims my blog is "commercial" in nature because I run Google Adsense ads on it and therefore I am not allowed to link to it.

Here is how the IMs went, entirely unedited:

---------[ Start ] ----------
Hi. Your blog contains multiple rotating ads and therefore it's not allowed to be linked in your signature. You can replace the link if the ads are removed. Here is a link to our rules.
http://www.irv2.com/forums/misc.php?do=sknetwork&page=rules
Thanks for understanding
Cliff
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I have read the rules you linked to and it says NO SUCH THING that I can find. Please point out the exact phrase you are referring to.
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Here is the paragraph under signature standards.

" Signatures must be setup in your profile rather than manually added to your messages. They will appear at the bottom of every post you make.
Signatures must be kept to a maximum of three lines (including blank lines) and contain no more than one link. (non-commercial).
Signatures may not include email addresses, links to competing websites, prompts to contact or a sales pitch.
Signatures must follow our forums posting standards and only one line may be bolded. "
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That says nothing about "no ads on your personal website".
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Your  " personal website " that you refer to as a blog was linked in your signature and as mentioned has multiple ads running in it which makes it commercial and therefore not allowed here.
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You sir, are full of ****. I am closing out my IRV2 account and will not be recommending this site to anyone, ever.
---------[ End ] ----------

The **** was "shit" edited by the forum software. It kinds of ruins the effect haha.

Review is done

My SSDI review is done and all went well as expected. Now that it's finished, I am looking forward and considering going back on the road this fall.

I want to get back out to Arkansas to visit family and friends, and to also pick up my trailer, scooter and other belongings stored at my mom's house.

I have a rough draft of a route planned out which involves stopping through Yellowstone National Park on my way southeast.

Stay tuned for more details later!