The Jackery: the one thing that changed how we road trip

Okay you guys. If you've watched any of our van videos you've seen the big gray box with the orange handle. People ask about it more than they ask about the bunk beds. So let's talk about the Jackery, because it's honestly the best thing we have ever added to the van and I don't think we'd go on half as many road trips without it.

Quick note: affiliate links below. If you buy through them I get a little commission at no cost to you, and I only ever link things we own and use. This is one of those.

What it does for us

Ours is the Jackery Explorer 2000 v2 portable power station. It's a big battery in a box with regular wall outlets on the front, and that's the magic of it. We have real power in the van, wherever we are, whenever we want it. Especially at night.

So what do we plug into it? Everything. I blow dry my hair (that one sucks up a LOT of power, more on that in a second). We cook our food. We heat water in our little kettle every single morning. We charge six kids' worth of devices and my camera and the Yoto and the phones. And the thing I'd miss most: we run fans while we sleep. Anyone who has tried to sleep eight people in a van in July knows that a fan at night is the difference between a fun trip and everybody crying at breakfast.

It charges off the van while we drive, so we roll into camp full. We've never once run it dead on a normal trip.

The blow dryer thing. A hair dryer pulls somewhere around 1500 watts, which is more than almost anything else we own, so five minutes of drying takes a real bite out of the battery. It's fine. I do it. But if you're deciding between sizes, the blow dryer is the reason I'm glad we have the big one.

Girls camp

A few weeks ago I brought the Jackery to girls camp. I was mostly thinking about my own phone and my fan. Y'all, by the second night EVERYONE was using it. Fans, string lights, phones, somebody's speaker, the whole camp was lined up at the big gray box like it was a gas station. It was a lifesaver and I'm never going to camp without it again.

And here's the fun part. Another leader brought the smaller Jackery, the little one you can carry with one hand, and it was great too. It doesn't have nearly the battery life of mine, but for a weekend of camping where you just want lights and phones, it did the job. So you don't have to get the big one. You just have to get one.

Why the 2000 v2 specifically

I'm not going to pretend I read spec sheets before we bought ours. Chris did. But I've read a bunch of the reviews since, and they line up with what we've lived: it holds a little over 2000 watt hours, which is enough to run most of what a family plugs in, it puts out 2200 watts, and it's about 39 pounds, which for the amount of power in there is light. OutdoorGearLab tested it for six months of camping and said it comes closer to doing it all than any power station they have tried, and that the price for the capacity is hard to beat. The battery is the kind that's rated for thousands of charges, so this isn't something you replace in two years, and it can recharge from a wall outlet in under two hours, which matters when you're doing laundry at a hotel and want to leave full.

The one knock reviewers give it is that you can't add extra battery packs to it later. We've never needed to. If we ever do, a second one costs less than the expandable version.

Which Jackery should you get

Three sizes, and I've seen all three in real use now.

Explorer 2000 v2. Ours. The one for a big family, a fridge, a kettle, a blow dryer, and a week or more in the van. If you're going to do this a lot, get this one and you'll never think about power again.

Explorer 1000 v2. Half the battery, half the price, still runs a fan all night and charges everything. This is the one I'd tell my sister to buy for weekend camping and shorter trips. It's the best seller for a reason.

Solar Generator 300 with the panel. The little one from girls camp. Lights, phones, a fan, and it recharges off the sun. Perfect for tent camping, a kid's first camping trip, or keeping in the car just in case.

And whichever one you get, get the car charging cable. This is what makes the whole thing work for road trips instead of just camping.

It's a battery in a box and it changed our whole life on the road. If you have one, tell me what you plug into it, because I'm always looking for something new to run off the big gray box.

Everything else that lives in the van with it is on the full list: bellebucket.com/road-trip-essentials. And the van tour itself is here: bellebucket.com/the-oneal-mobile.