This Pop Top Camper Can Handle The Adventurous Family Of Five
Van life is all about getting out on the road in your favourite adventure bus and seeing the world. You don’t have to own a monster camper to feel a sense of wanderlust or awe when you’re out there exploring the wild; you need something that can accommodate you and your family as you go in search of pastures new. Space can often be the issue if you’re travelling with friends or loved ones, but this pop top camper from The Erwin Hymer group is perfect for the digital nomad family that loves to travel the globe. Let’s take a look!
Get Aktiv 2.0 With This Perfect Pop Up Camper
Now, for those of you that read these articles carefully, you might have recognised the name Erwin Hymer before. They’re also the creators of the Carado Axion that we covered a few days ago, and they also happen to be the largest RV manufacturer in the multiverse. Telltale signs are there if you know where to look; the Ram Promaster as the base vehicle is a key giveaway if you didn’t have the factsheet in front of you as we do. This pop top camper is Hymers latest bash at capturing the American market with European style campervan conversions, and while it’s very similar to the Axion on the outside, the inside is a totally different ballgame (like English football and American football…you get the picture).
What’s On The Outside?
The Aktiv 2.0 is a pop top camper that covers every base if you’re spending time living off the grid. It’s got all of the necessary inlets and outlets that you need for filling up and emptying on the go, which is surprisingly easy when you’re on the road in Europe (check out our guide to Travelling In A Van!). There’s lots of exterior lighting for night time driving and parking, and a rearview camera for getting into those tight supermarket spots.
The exterior paint job makes it fit well into sandy beach park spots and dusty desert park ups, and it’s also a pretty ‘family safe colour’ (most people tend to find beige pretty inoffensive). The driver, passenger and side doors can all get powered step upgrades that fold down to help you get in and out. This is nice American touch to a European style van, one that we made the most of when getting in and out of enormous Dodge Ram Four Wheel Campers that we reviewed over in California. It also comes with something called a Stability program as standard, which gives you wind and sway assist, engine drag control, rollover mitigation, trailer sway, X drift compensation and electronic stability control. That’s a lot of extra help when you’re driving in harsh conditions, and it should give you some piece of mind when your children are on board too.
The most exciting part of this pop top camper, however, is the pop top roof! We’ve seen lots of other pop top motors such as the classic Volkswagen Bus Camper, or the worlds first fully electric campervan, but it makes a high top vehicle like the Aktiv 2.0 even more accessible to larger families and gives you so much more room!
What’s Inside This Pop Top Camper?
The 249-inch extended wheelbase van gives you so much room to play with, and Hymer has made this pop top camper a tiny home fit for your adventurous family, complete with a Bluetooth navigation device, so you don’t have to spoil your trip arguing about who read the paper map wrong.
You can choose from four different colours in your interior; Granite Metallic, Bright White, Sandstone Pearl, and Silver Ice (I sound like Bob Ross!) The front seats swivel around, making a comfortable family dining or games area, and the sofa at the side can flip down into an extra bed with ease, but we’ll get to the beds in a little while.
There is so much storage inside this pop top camper, a feature that is a typical look that you’ll find in every European style conversion on the market. Cupboards surround the adequately sized kitchen area, which has it’s own sink and hob, microwave oven and cooking/worktop space for preparing your meals. If you’re used to a tiny eco house then the room inside this pop top camper will blow you away!
What’s The Tech Like?
Pretty good if we’re honest, and there’s plenty to keep the kids occupied on rainy days. For starters, there’s a 24 inch TV with an HDMI hookup – we’re thinking Mario Kart tournaments 24/7! There’s an inverter to charge up your gadgets, and air conditioning and a heater to adapt the temperature inside to work best with your environment. We haven’t seen any information about solar panels as of yet, but that pop top looks like the perfect place to mount a lightweight one to make your off-grid adventure last even longer!
Taking A Trip To Snoozetown
Hymer prides itself on the beds in this pop top camper, so much so that we’ve found tonnes of literature and facts and figures on the individual widths and heights of each one. The fold out bed is about the size of a regular queen sized mattress (178 x 180 cm), and the rear ‘master’ bed gives you a length of about 1.8m. That might be a little bit short if you have long legs, but I guess it all depends on who is the little spoon in the relationship. The loft bed is by far the longest at 1.98m, but at 1.28m it’s also quite narrow. For me, feeling like a kid and sleeping in the pop top camper bed would be the ideal situation, but I’ll leave it to you to have this serious conversation with your own families – choosing the right bed can make or break a holiday!
Final Thoughts…
I know that a lot of the pictures have just had a family of four in for marketing purposes, but this vehicle really can sleep five with the inclusion of the pull out sofa bed near the fold-down kitchen table. When the sofa is up, it can also house 7-people while in motion, so you can always give some friendly locals a lift to the shop on the way. If you’re only going to be using it for four, however, you can remove the fixed bed and make a storage aisle for bikes and surfboards when they’re not in use, which has to be pretty handy!
This is a safe option for parents that want to take their kids out on an adventure, but safe isn’t a bad thing in this instance. It’s a great camper with tonnes of room and doesn’t include any unnecessary bells and whistles that will break after a few trips.
The Aktiv 2.0 pop top camper comes in at $114,127, which does make it pretty inaccessible to families on a low income. But, if you have the money saved or you’re thinking about selling up and living in a van, then this would be a perfect choice. If we had the money, and the time we might be inclined to go down the route of handmade Mercedes Sprinter conversions instead, but if the thought of picking up a handsaw makes you feel weak at the knee then play it safe and order this pop top camper from Hymer today.
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