Box truck camping tips..

[lucky420]

what day are you picking yours up?

[junglesmacks]

what day are you picking yours up?

We fly in late Thursday night and are staying with some friends in Reno and we'd like to get a jump on things and start preparing early for once, so we're shooting to rent it Friday and spend the 48 hours gathering things and pre-cooking meals. Returning it by the Monday after the burn and spending 48 hours at the Sands transportation-less until we catch an airport shuttle and leave on Wednesday..

I checked into rental car prices from Thurs/Fri - Sun and it was like twice as much as just renting the truck and driving it around town.. lol

[lucky420]

picking mine up friday too. I wouldn't rent a car either, you'll be within walking distance of everything downtown and we've got zillion cabs if needed

[lazerfox]

would they still have trucks left if our reservation is for pickup on Sunday?

[junglesmacks]

would they still have trucks left if our reservation is for pickup on Sunday?

Absolutely. If you reserved it and it's confirmed, then they won't mess with your truck. They're good like that. Sunday is the day that most pickup anyway..

[yumyumms]

Ive been doing the Gentry way truck rental thing too for the last couple years. Theyve also got a $100 deal where theyll clean the truck out for you, you just need to make sure you have recyclables separated and such. Its a deal and a time saver. It costs somewhere around $80 to have them clean the truck out at the closest car wash to the Gentry way location, when you factor in how tired you are and time constraints... Its a deal for sure.

[yumyumms]

BTW smacks- if youre checking car rentals, remember that any rental from an airport is always gonna be more expensive, they usually add on extra taxes and such

[junglesmacks]

BTW smacks- if youre checking car rentals, remember that any rental from an airport is always gonna be more expensive, they usually add on extra taxes and such

Yeah.. I use Hotwire and Priceline for rental cars and they check surrounding locations. I just checked again and prices have dropped.. hmm. $18/day for a compact car from Thurs-Sat via Hotwire. I may just do that. Although.. it would be nice to just have the truck to fill up..

[BoyScoutGirl]

'smacks, thanks for the info re: gas vs. diesel. When I switched from a gate to a no-gate truck, I noticed the change in fuel type and wondered. The kind Budget lady on the phone told me that the trucks with gates are in higher demand for commercial rentals - maybe because they're diesel?


I'm scheduled to pick up my truck at noon on Sunday but since the train (supposedly) gets in at 8am, I'm thinking of showing up as soon as I can at Gentry Way with my sweetest smile on - maybe I can get an hour or two extra out of the rental.

[junglesmacks]

Remember though that you need to return the truck within an hour or two of your original rental time or else you'll be charged for an extra day. Since I leave camp by 6AM Monday, I usually make it to Reno by noon at the outset. I'm renting the truck around 1pm on Thursday so that I can make sure to have the times all coincide..

[BoyScoutGirl]

That's a good point. For some reason when making my reservation I got the notion that noon was the latest pick-up time, so I specifically reserved for noon so as to have the latest corresponding return time possible. I guess 1pm was an option and I just didn't see it somehow.

It's cool though - I'll be leaving Tuesday AM so I should be good. Should be.

Not like the Amtrak will be on time anyhow...

[junglesmacks]

Yeah anytime is fine really. Once you have it locked for you, you're good. They're super cool there and will hold it no matter what time you get there. It's the Budget computer though that has a rental contract write time stamp and a return and run the card time stamp and those can't be more than an hour late.

MORE TIME STAMPS!!

[SnowBlind]

would they still have trucks left if our reservation is for pickup on Sunday?

Absolutely. If you reserved it and it's confirmed, then they won't mess with your truck. They're good like that. Sunday is the day that most pickup anyway..

Just as a heads up for others, that is not true for all companies. UHaul in particular is known for that. A reservation with them basically means that there is a higher likelihood to actually get what you reserved.

We picked a trailer up from them a couple of years ago, and the guy in front of us was moving, and had a tight schedule, so he really needed the truck at the time he had reserved it for. The guy at counter told him he didn't have one, but might get one in later today or tomorrow, maybe. The renter was pretty mad. Later I read that that is a fairly common occurrence with them.

[junglesmacks]

Yeesh. U-Haul also cancelled my reservation 4 weeks before the burn the first time that I tried to rent a box truck. The lady that called was SO RUDE. I even tried to call back and make another reservation and give an entire story about moving but they weren't having it. All rentals in Reno get locked down around that time.

Budget is the only major box truck rental firm within Reno and the surrounding areas that is burner friendly! Don't even attempt it with any other company!

If you're coming from a far distance and not making it look like you're having anything to do with BM, you can possibly get away with it. But.. YMMV.. and you risk a last minute cancellation without warning.

[FeetOfClay]

Just called Budget yesterday (Gentry Way, of course) to confirm my reservation, and the guy was super friendly.
Looking forward to picking up my truck (aka: my house for a week)

I am hoping to use strong alligator clips to attach large pieces of light fabric to the back of my tent to act as "curtains" for privacy and shade. Anyone ever done this? Is there a rim or some sort of edge on the inside that things can be clipped to? (Can't seem to find any good pics of the back interior of trucks (around "door frame") online.

the fabrics i have are extremely thin and will allow air flow. i even have this one piece of odd synthetic fabric that has lots of slits in it....almost like a slitted mesh...

I plan to leave the back door open all week (unless i need shelter from an intense dust storm) and just use fabric to create a barrier on back side of truck. keep all valuable in truck cab or on my person.

[junglesmacks]

There are 1"x2" wooden stringers that run along the sides of the truck that are made to tie and secure things to. Last year, we strung a nylon cord from one side to the other and took a queen sized sheet and looped the first 6" over the cord and safety pinned it for our privacy curtain. Worked fine. You'll want to close the door when you leave the truck though.. just better that way.

Lemur reported using them to tie a hammock to with success.. so it sounds like they can hold some weight just fine.

Lemur's pic which I think may be a 10' truck as it looks pretty small.. but you can see the stringers on the side:

[gaminwench]

Just returned from 4Juplaya. Headed out in my vintage RV (no modcons), but she gave up just south of Reno.
Thanks to my obsessive eplaya habit, I knew that the Gentry Way Budget was the place to go for a replacement vehicle.
Awesome guy bumped me from a 10' to 12' when he found out we were headed to Black Rock... because the 12' was new!!!
When we came back to Reno, we discovered that we now needed a one-way to SoCal to get our dusty shit home; Awesome guy let us have the same truck (no messy transfer) for 3 days, 300 bucks, no mile charges!!!

Living in the box truck was easy, comfy and low dust...

Thanks to you, Junglesmacks, I was prepared!!!!

[junglesmacks]

NICE!!!!!! How did you like the front office with all the BM trinkets and toys?

It's hard to convey on here how much in actuality those guys really do love us and value very much our business and trust.. but it's true!

Awesome story

[BoyScoutGirl]

Do the Budget 16' box trucks have a window in the front of the box? I'm wondering if I should invest in some insulating/reflective material so heat from the front doesn't "leak" into the box. Or maybe just a windshield sun screen?

[lucky420]

No, there's no window

[Esteban Ohh]

i just tried this and im getting a much higher rate:



did the price go up since early July or am I doing something wrong or what?

well i guess it doesnt matter because i already paid and reserved a compact car rental from reno airport, and theres no refunds available. sigh. wish i saw this information posted from junglesmacks earlier!

p.s. i used hotwire for my car rental and tried priceline with name your own price using a price of like $150 or something, and the best i got for 6 days was: TOTAL out the door, taxes, fees, everything: $344. And that was booked back on July 19th.

[theCryptofishist]

Labor Day is the last three-day weekend of the summer, and traditionally there's a lot of road trips those days. We're competing against the rest of the country for rentals...
Supply
Demand
I'm not going to say "econ 101"

[junglesmacks]

i just tried this and im getting a much higher rate:

It's because you're trying to pick it up on Monday instead of Sunday. Change your rental day to Sunday and you can still claim that rate.

Check it out: I would reserve it for Sunday.. lock in the date.. and then call the location and say that something came up and you won't be able to pick it up until Monday. Your rate will be locked in and the rental clock doesn't start ticking until you actually pick it up.

Call them and ask and even be straight up honest with the guys there. They'll hook you up.

[Esteban Ohh]

i didnt know that. thanks! i would do this if i could get a refund on my rental car reservation.

p.s. i sent you a pm!

[BoyScoutGirl]

This is probably going to sound like paranoid over-preparation but I'm asking anyway because I refuse to be the new gal who gets stranded without fuel because she was too shy to ask.

I'm taking a 16' rental truck with a 55 gallon tank. The RV place in Fernley or truck stop would need a hose to get up about 8' to the top of the tank in the gate.

I'd been operating under the assumption that the gas tank was at, y'know, gas tank height. Anybody else have trouble like described above when getting their truck gassed up? Or have trouble getting fuel because their truck was too tall to fit near the pump?

Also, my truck will take diesel. I don't think I've ever been to a major, highway-side gas station (in the US) that didn't have diesel for sale, but Google Maps is telling me that the closest place to get diesel is about halfway to Fernley from Reno. But then Google Maps also doesn't seem to know about the Nixon gas station mentioned in the Survival Guide, so maybe I should just listen to the survival guide instead of Google...

tl;dr Where can I get diesel into my box truck, nearest to the playa?

edit: Found some good info on where to gas up here: http://www.burningman.com/preparation/travel_info/ but I would still like advice on which (diesel-selling) gas stations are friendliest for large, boxy vehicles. Thanks!

[theCryptofishist]

Fernly has a couple of truck stops. I find it very difficult indeed to believe that they aren't equipped. However, I have no direct knowledge, so wait until it's confirmed by someone who's done it....

[FIGJAM]

He was talking about his water barrel being that high.

The love's truckstop in fernley on I80 is where I get my final fuel.

[captain mcguiver]

yeah I was referring to water, not fuel.

[BoyScoutGirl]

I should have realized - 55 gallons of gas is a lot of fuel!

[lucky420]

FYI budget trucks in Carson City just posted in Craigslist that they will also rent to people heading up to BRC