2023 Overland Expo West Overview: The Most Ingenious Gear and Adventure-Ready Rigs

Overland Expo West returned to Flagstaff, AZ, this past weekend for its 15th year bringing together spectators and enthusiasts eager to check out the latest and greatest off-roading, camping, and cooking gear available from an exploding market and industry. The grounds of Fort Tuthill County park played host to over 30,000 visitors and 417 exhibitors, many of whom camped in trucks, on SUVs, and next to motorcycles on site, making this year’s show the biggest yet.

Amid the massive rigs, ubiquitous rooftop tents, and clever concessions to creature comfort, I visited OE for my first time, curious to wander the massive grounds and witness just how many overlanders today actually buy the kinds of eye-popping gear that makes the craze so eminently Instagrammable—while also hoping to get a better read on how to build the best rigs possible on a tight budget.

OEM Builds on Display

Other than the swelling crowds of attendees, probably the biggest single indicator of overlanding’s growing popularity is the fact that Toyota chose OE as the location for the next-generation Tacoma pickup truck’s official public debut. Posed on prim little rocks to show off a bit of axle articulation, two Tacomas in the new top-spec Trailhunter and simple PreRunner trims attracted curious fans throughout the weekend. The decision to show off the PreRunner, with two-wheel drive and leaf springs, seemed a little odd given the massive and expensive 4x4s dotting the rest of the show, but Toyota’s presence hints at the potential market reach that OEM’s see in overlanding.

Polaris also debuted an all-new side-by-side dubbed XPedition and catered directly to overlanding with a beefed-up chassis, enclosed cab, and flat roof. Product director for Polaris Off-Road David Elia walked me through the new RZR sibling, which arrived, of course, decked out with lights, brush guards, air conditioning, and a roof-top tent.

“We literally started this project years ago with this concept in mind,” Elia said. “We knew we wanted to deliver a true adventure vehicle. It's got the off-road capability you would expect from a Polaris side-by-side. It's 64 inches wide, which is similar to some of our RZRs and Generals, it's got 14 inches of ground clearance, 14 to 15 inches of suspension travel on Fox shocks, and 30-inch tires.”

Related: A Complete Guide to Car Camping on the Cheap

The idea of needing to tow a side-by-side with a truck in order to go off-roading sounds a bit much to me, but then Elia reminds me that in some regions, side-by-sides can be legally driven on public roads with only a few modifications. And more importantly, the XPedition’s narrow track means it can reach wilderness that some trucks and SUVs simply can’t.

“It's got all that capability of a side-by-side,” he said, “So you can go on rough terrain, and you can go on trails. The difference was designing a chassis that fit on the side-by-side trails but could take the weight and capability of a full-cab system with glass, heat, air conditioning, and roof rack.”

What’s the Difference Between Camping and Overlanding?

Even if OEMs recognize how much money passionate overlanders bring to the table, I signed on to attend the 2023 Overland Expo eager to discover how enthusiasts in the real world—rather than in advertisements or on Instagram—actually put their vehicles and gear to work. Luckily, I almost immediately bumped into popular YouTuber and overlanding expert Brad Kowitz of TrailRecon and asked him to help clear up the difference between traditional camping and overlanding.

“Car camping is what we grew up doing, and now we've just put an extra name on it,” Kowitz said. “We're a little more self-sufficient and we're doing it for longer distances. Here in the U.S., we're so massive and we have so much public lands that if you're self-contained for two or three days, how is that not overlanding?”

For overlanding industry giants and influencers, fully kitted rigs built on brand-new vehicles fit into the aspirational image they need to portray—not to mention the companies whose products they need to test and advocate. I also spoke with Clay and Rachelle Croft, of the popular Expedition Overland (XO) video series, about how they decided to begin working with automotive manufacturers to build awesome trucks capable of going just about anywhere on the planet.

“There are two sides to overlanding,” Clay said. “There's the mobility side, the driving aspect and the vehicle, then there's the livability side. There's no doubt there's always going to be a nostalgic appeal to working on older vehicles because of their simplicity. However, as soon as you drive those nostalgic vehicles for very long, you realize why they're outdated.

“We live in Montana and you need a well-maintained vehicle just naturally being in that place. So we worked with the vehicles that we had and modified them for years before we started building brand new trucks."

“Also, having the warranty available was a plus,” Rachelle said. “I can just take this to the dealership and we don't have to figure out all of this on our own. Every Toyota that we've ever ran, knock on wood, we've never had an issue with and that's part of why we use Toyotas and Lexuses—for the reliability.”

At the Top of the Overlanding Market

Fully built overlanding rigs based on brand-new trucks can ramp up in price seriously fast, though. To learn a bit more about the top end of the market, I visited with Pavel Bossovik of 27North, whose over-the-top 30A Ascender I first spotted at SEMA last year. Bossovik brought an Ascender to Overland Expo, of course, but in contrast to that halo build—which can run anywhere from $750,000 to $1.75 million depending on customer preferences—he also brought a new RexRover 22-footer based on an F-250.

For readers wondering how an F-250 might realistically haul a massive cab-over camper, RexRover aims to shave weight everywhere possible with a monolithic fiberglass shell and aluminum used in place of wood for almost every other surface. All told, the truck weighs about a third of a typical full-spec rig, tipping the scale at around 8,000 pounds all in—even with a popular laundry machine installed.

The RexRover also starts at “only” $369,000 and Bossovik told me 27North already has six orders on the book out of a planned run of 70 builds for 2023. That figure puts the RexRover in a competitive position at the top of the market when looking at other trucks at Overland Expo, including much larger builds from EarthRoamer and EarthCruiser.

At Overland Expo, creative solutions for bringing almost all of the comforts of home out into the wild made up most of the show. Roof-top tents, expandable awnings, shower and toilet tents, entire foldout kitchen setups—compiling a wishlist of gear adds up fast, so the appeal of a single ready-built overlander all of a sudden looks much more attractive.

Getting Into Overlanding on the Cheap

Committed overlanders with six-figure rigs might scoff at my relative thriftiness, but Brad Kowitz and the Crofts of Expedition Overland know it’s easy to get into overlanding on the cheap, too.

“It can be a little overwhelming when you come to this,” Kowitz said. “So just remember that you only need the basics. Start small, check out what folks are doing and walk the campsites, because there's a whole variety of stuff to see. That to me is always the most interesting part. You find a lot of clever solutions to problems.”

“With the world of Instagram showing everybody's trucks built to the hilt, it doesn't require that,” Rachelle said. “It requires an adventurous spirit, a problem-solving attitude, and the desire to see the world. And with a hint of curiosity, you can have a whole lot of fun. So the trucks and the crazy builds might come later for you, but don't worry about starting there.”

The stars of Trail Recon and Expedition Overland spent most of Overland Expo chatting with viewers, meeting fans, and translating their on-screen excitement into real-life inspiration. All over the show, booths and experiences ran the gamut from lessons on off-road driving (getting stuck and unstuck) to first aid, simple gear instructions, and even a fun cooking demonstration with squid as the surprise ingredient. As I moseyed around, I also spoke with a few inventors with smaller-scale solutions to some of overlanding’s biggest challenges. More than a couple previously appeared on the reality show Shark Tank, as another indication of overlanding’s expanding influence.

Related: You’re Not Too Broke For Overland Travel

Over at the LavaBox booth, founder Josh Thurmond got about as lucky as possible when an Arizona monsoon rolled in on Friday afternoon dropping hail and torrential rains for a few hours. In the cold, his small fire pits based on military ammo cans sold like hotcakes.

Thurmond’s background in whitewater sports led to creating a first LavaBox prototype in 2020, with hopes of providing a simple and safe warmth of a campfire during fire bans. Now the little LavaBox can deliver up to 280,000 BTUs of heat sitting five inches off the ground, meeting the requirements of stage 2 bans in most regions. They can also run on a low level for two hours per pound of propane. With ceramic-weave “Hades stones” inside, the whole setup weighs only 8.5 pounds—and $1 from each purchase goes towards Protect Our Rivers, a Colorado-based nonprofit organization that has cleaned up hundreds of tons of garbage.

Thurmond pitched the Sharks in March of this year, as did the crew at Flated, an inflatables company (also with watersports background, turns out) that jumped into the rooftop camper business during the pandemic. Compared to a traditional fiberglass camper shell for a full-sized pickup truck bed, which might weight 200 to 300 pounds, Flated’s air system weighs as little as 53 pounds and requires only 5 to 8 PSI of pressure. Cofounder Ryan Guay told me his Flated camper only needed one round of re-inflation over two hard years suffering through Montana weather, a statement almost as impressive as when they let a motorcyclist ride up into a truck bed using one of their panels as a ramp.

Simple Solutions and Silly Enthusiasts

The low weight of Flated’s storage and camper systems makes the system extra enticing for me, since normal rooftop tents put so much heft at the very worst place for an off-roading vehicle. But I’ve always been into lightweight camping, ever since early days backpacking as a scrawny five-foot-tall Cub Scout. When I spotted ?tzi Adventure Gear’s flat-pack grills and accessories, I needed to give them a better look—but because I’m a total car geek, I ended up chatting with the owner about his V10 diesel Touareg more than about the actual products he brought to sell at Overland Expo.

The enthusiasm for an engine-swapped Touareg reflects just how far many overlanders will go to build their dream setup, as proven when I walked the campground just like Kowitz suggested and witnessed how the purpose-built perfectly posed show trucks translate to real-world overlanding. I can admit to expecting more beat-up old Monteros and Land Cruisiers, but instead found a ton of trucks with full trailers, massive canopies, showers and bathrooms, full kitchens, and of course rooftop tents galore. Overlanding on the cheap might be a thing of the past, it turns out, so maybe Dometic’s uber-expensive fridges make a bit more sense to me now.

At the very least, I found myself amazed by how many of these trailers—which can easily range from $30,000 to $70,000—actually get used, how often the Skottle grills actually cook food, and how many people actually make the commitment to climbing up and down a flimsy ladder into a rooftop tent rather than sleeping on the ground the old-fashioned way. For me, I still prefer sleeping in a pitched tent, but Kakadu’s compact cot tent also seemed much more reasonable all of a sudden.

Testing the Ultimate Overlanding Vehicle

Perhaps hoping to prompt a shift in my frugal mind, Overland Expo’s organizers offered me a chance to take their Ultimate Overland Vehicle build for a test ride on the muddy track at the Vehicle Expedition Skills Area. Based on a 2023 Lexus LX 600, one of the most luxurious SUVs I’ve ever driven, the UOV this year gets a full suspension setup using Total Chaos long-travel control arms and Radflo 2.5-inch remote reservoir coilover shocks, Icon Dynamics wheels with 33-inch Kenda RT tires, and new bumpers from ARB and CBI Offroad.

Towed behind the Lexus, Off Grid Trailers contributed the Pando 2.0 trailer with a 360-degree articulating hitch, 24 inches of ground clearance, a shower and kitchen, and even a pizza oven. Sound a bit much for off-camber mud pits and slippery berms? Guess again. Even with wheels off the ground and keeping track of the trailer’s tighter turning radius behind me, I put the LX 600 easily through the paces with 4-Lo and the center diff locked.

Related: Best Thru-hiking Gear That'll Go the Distance

What a stunning combination of comfort and capability, and especially when compared to the road car’s composure. OE promised a multi-day trip with the build coming up later this summer, so stay tuned to learn whether I wrap up with a newfound penchant for all-in, high-priced overlanding rigs—I’d still say unlikely, given my affinity for ‘90s Mitsubishis, but then again pizza on the trail sounds pretty delicious. With a full camper setup, food in the fridge(s), and hot water for days, the chances that I could get further out into the wilderness only increase—especially if I bring a Starlink dish along for internet, as did almost 100 percent of Overland Expo attendees.

Regardless of my position on high-priced builds, though, I definitely left Overland Expo feeling inspired to plan more off-roading trips into my calendar. To an extent, that’s the exact enthusiasm Kowitz, the Crofts, the event organizers, and just every exhibitor at the show hope to foster.

“The whole point of what we do is to experience the world,” Clay said. “At the end of the day, we believe that travel makes you a better person. So whether that's starting in your backyard or your state park and then going a little farther as you get comfortable, for the most part, you will learn, you will grow, and you will problem solve. This in turn helps personal growth, empowers you, and provides purpose and confidence. There's a lot of layers, but that's really why we do what we do.”

The Best New Gear We Saw at 2023 Overland Expo West

This year’s OE West drew record numbers of visitors and exhibitors, but amid all the uber-expensive rooftop tents and six-figure rigs, some smaller pieces of gear on display seemed perfect for bringing at least some of the convenience of home out onto the trail. Here's a closer look at our top picks from Overland Expo West.

A portable shower is an important piece of gear for clean freaks. This nifty hot water heater is the size of two shoeboxes and runs off the same fuel can as a Coleman stove. While we wouldn't say it's affordable, per se, it is convenient. Drop the filtered hose intake into any water source—a jug, stream, or pond. Just one can of gas will get you four hours of hot running water, helpful for showers and the ability to kickstart cook times for boiling water.

Speaking of water, Dometic’s new “Go” water faucet delivers running water at a cheaper price point—just without the heat. A magnetic base attaches to any metal surface and a built-in battery can pump 150 liters (40 gallons) on a single charge. The faucet can also be combined with the Dometic Go Water Jug, which allows for the attachment of any filtration system that works on a Nalgene bottle.

In regions that ban open fires for much of the year, contained grills can totally transform overlanding cooking. A line of flat-pack grills from ?tzi Adventure Gear doubles down on packing efficiency by using entirely flat surfaces. A two-person grill built out of stainless steel can weigh as little as eight pounds and pack into a 13x13-inch square, while using charcoal or firewood to char anything on the menu.

Skottle traces its origins to South African farmers reusing harrow discs, the blades on tillers, as cooking surfaces. Popular now on Instagram, Skottle grills made a widespread appearance at Overland Expo. In person, the combined practicality of a standup wok, Coleman stove, barbecue, and seasoned cast-iron skillet seems pretty hard to beat.

This nifty little piece of metal looks simple but makes a big difference in safety while using a bottle jack, whether to lift up trucks and change a flat tire, repair axles, ball joints, or steering components. The bracket solidly grips solid axles, front or rear, which is all the more important for overlanding rigs with a ton of suspension travel. Instead of lifting the body and frame while combating articulation, Bottle Jack Buddy allows compact bottle jacks to effectively do the job of much larger floor jacks. It's proudly built in the U.S. by a family-owned company and sold in 41 countries.

Rather than shelling out for a fully built, extremely expensive cabover camper, why not ask OVRLND Campers of Flagstaff, AZ, to build a simple shell of aluminum? With no kitchen, no bathroom, and not even a sleeping platform, the aluminum pop-top campers allow for headroom over 6’5” and create a perfect weatherproof cabin ready for customization and modification—all while weighing in as low as 275 pounds.

On an entirely different realm of preparedness than most of the gear at 2023 Overland Expo, 74Weld’s insane portal axles can now immediately transform the ubiquitous Toyota Tacoma into a legit rock crawler. Company president Quinn Pultz showed off the ingenious engineering that makes portal axles so durable, while allowing for the installation of 37-inch tires on an otherwise stock truck—and with enough ground clearance to drive straight over a five-gallon bucket.