After Jessica and I shifted from the 35ft fifth wheel to the 13ft pop up, we immediately found many advantages and disadvantages of joining onto this class of RV. Obviously if you have any sort of head for math, size is a big difference. And that’s what most people say when you ask them about living in a popup. But I say isn’t that a big factor in wanting to live this sort of lifestyle, to travel and live on less?

Pop ups have a great design, in that they can compact themselves down to half of their extended size length and height wise, making pulling them on the road worlds easier than any trailer out there. And given their reduced size, just about any vehicle can pull them. There is no longer a need for a big gas guzzling dually pulling these little guys.

Some people also frown on the fact of setting it up once you get to a site, thinking the dramatic change in appearance takes a lot of work. But actually once you get familiar with the short procedure, it can be set up in 15 minutes or so. Getting set up goes as follows:

1. Unhook and pull away your vehicle to give room for the slides
2. crank down your stabilizers
3. unlatch your four top locks
4. crank up the top
5. pull out your slides and mount the support poles
6. lock down your door

….and that’s about it in a nutshell.

I actually like the interior of our pop up, the makers were quite creative with storage space and how everything stows away. And once you get all the windows unzipped, which can seem like a chore at times, the unit breathes quite nicely. Other trailers can make you feel shut off from your new surroundings. When we were in Yellowstone, we got set up at a campground just outside the North entrance. Our site was literally backed up to the Yellowstone River, I can’t count the times that I sat in the bed with all the windows around it open absorbing the sounds and beautiful view.

Pop ups are sometimes on the basic side of things. Most older models don’t have bathrooms or AC. And the fabric walls can take away some privacy, as sound travels in and out pretty easily.

Most newer models come fully decked out and have become decent competitors with their hard sided bigger brothers. They have big AC units, slide outs, and bathrooms with showers.

We love ours for it’s ease of pulling. You can basically take it anywhere being that it’s smaller than most boat trailers. Our does have a 3 burner gas grill that sits on the counter in the kitchen area or you can hook it up to a rail system on the outside, making it great for cooking under the stars.

Like ours, most have an awning, these in most cases aren’t going to be the nice self retractors that you see on the big-boy RVs. They are all manual with poles to assemble. I’ve found that it takes more time to set up the awning then it does the whole rig. Ours also has an optional screen room that attaches with zippers to the awning. We use this extra room as our kitchen to leave more room inside.

A downside to traveling with a pop up trailer is when you want to stop for the night to get some zzz’s. When me and Jessica are traveling and need to make a stop to rest, we normally find refuge by boondocking in a Wal-mart parking lot or roadside rest area. Being that no sliding-out or popping-up is allowed in these places, we have to sleep in the truck. If we had pretty much any other rig, we would have the ability to crawl in and sleep in our bed. So that is one drawback.

A lot of people ask if it leaks during rainstorms, and I can answer that through all of the storms that we have been through in ours, we have not seen one drop come inside. One couple at the campground did have a problem, they forgot to zip up their windows before they went sight seeing. A storm rolled in and soaked everything that they had. So, zipping up the windows before you go anywhere is a must.

Another time at the campground, a pop up owner got to his site and was eager to set up, so eager in fact, that he started cranking up his top before unlatching all of his latches. As he cranked, it got tighter and tighter. So tight that it busted the cabling lift system that runs throughout the unit. Needless to say, he wasn’t too eager after that and had to use 2x4s to prop open his top until he could work on it in the morning.

If you like more of a camping feel, don’t need a lot of space, prefer fresh air over AC, and don’t want a lot of hassles while towing… a pop up may be just what you’re looking for.