Until recently, I didn’t even know that 12v refrigerators were a thing that you could buy, but once I found out, I couldn’t stop thinking about how convenient it could be for our road trip. After some research, I settled on the BougeRV CRPRO 30. (For some reason it is much cheaper at Walmart than Amazon.) This particular model is powered by either 12v or 120v and the temperature can be set anywhere from -8F to 50F. Theoretically it has a voltage meter built in so it will shut off if the car battery gets low, but so far I have been unplugging it when we leave the car for very long.
I’ve enjoyed four main benefits over a traditional cooler besides the obvious one of not having to buy ice:
- Initially, it looks tiny when you compare it to a cooler, but when you realize you don’t have to add ice, it suddenly feels much bigger.
- I can easily add more cans/bottles to it as you go and they will get cooled off without destroying your ice in the process. (Did you know it takes over half a bag of ice to chill a 12 pack?)
- One of the last things I would do before a trip is buy ice and pack the cooler. With this, I can just have it sitting on the floor in the kitchen plugged into the wall and I can throw stuff in throughout the week.
- In a cooler, I have to protect many things from getting wet. With this, I don’t have to mess with all those extra bags.
We used it on our recent camping trip and it was great! It held all the chilled food that we needed and then we restocked it with drinks throughout the weekend. We had it plugged into the truck on the drive to the campground and then we used power at our campsite to keep it cold.
It was definitely a luxury to have it at the campsite, but I think where it will really be useful is on our big road trip coming up later this summer. We almost always pack lunches and snacks to save money and time so instead of buying endless bags of ice, we’ll have an easy way to keep things cool. It’s a little awkward to carry into the hotel and back to the car every night, but I bought a shoulder strap to go with it that will hopefully make it simpler.