Central Coasting: Camping on top of your car

A Santa Cruz company is taking camping to a whole new level – up and off the ground.

Evan Currid and his wife developed Tepui Tents six years ago. The tents sit atop your car, and just like the tents, business is moving upwards.

“It started with two little models in our garage, graduated to a storage unit, and then you know things just kept evolving,” said Currid

Originally developed for the outdoor enthusiast, Currid says he’s had camping experts, surfers, mountain bikers, and even tourists come check them out.

“Married couples would come in and it’d be the wife that’d say, I’ll go camping with you, but I’m not going to go camping in a ground tent. If you get one of these I’ll go camping with you,” said Currid, who claims an elevated tent has a number of advantages over traditional tents.

“Well, conventional tents work, but they don’t hold up as well in harsh winds and rain and things like that,” he said. “And if the ground isn’t flat and level it becomes very uncomfortable.”

Currid demonstrated how the rooftop tent operates.

“If I push this ladder up – I won’t close it completely — but you can see that it can fold up upon itself,” he said. “So this would be folded up on top of your car when you get to camp. You’d unzip this travel cover, you grab the ladder that’s stored on top, and you pull it out and set the ladder height.”

At Seacliff Beach, David Gilbert, a Sacramento RV camper, thought the idea was interesting.

“It is kind of cool because you can go anywhere pretty much, especially if you have four wheel drive, and set it up instead of trying to sleep in the back of the car like we did in our college days,” he said.

Currid and his wife say the Tepui Tents allow everyone to enjoy the outdoors.

“It’s almost like being a kid again with the ladder, like a bunk bed,” said Currid. “Yeah, it doubles as a tree fort.”