I wasn’t going to do it… I told myself I didn’t want a roof rack on my 1991 Mitsubishi Montero. But as I’ve grown to use this a bit more for adventure, my desire to increase its functionality has changed my plans. I want to add an awning to the truck and that means I need a place to hang said awning. Which means I needed a roof rack. So I turned to Gamiviti Racks to have one built for the truck, and it arrived this past week.

Gamiviti typically makes racks for Toyota and Lexus products. But since they can make stuff to fit a given truck’s requirements, I provided a few measurements and Gamiviti set to work. I needed a custom setup since I have to run a rack that adheres to the rain gutter mounts of my truck. There were only one or two decent off-the-shelf options, but when I tallied up the price on those ones it was the same or even more than a custom-built rack from Gamiviti.

My rack has some tabs in place should I decide to add more lighting options down the road. And Gamiviti offers an inexpensive lightbar as an option, which I decided to say yes to. Now I have to get the lightbar wired up before I can show and test how well it works. For now, it’s just fitted into place to see how it is going to look. And I have to say I’m quite happy with how this rack sits on the truck. The original towers sent over were just a hair too short, as the rack was touching the roof in the back. But Gamiviti quickly sent out replacement towers to give me another inch of clearance and it’s good to go now.

Besides the rack, the Montero has a few more goodies to add inside the rear cargo area. Dometic has sent over a powered cooler and portable battery system. This is something I’m supremely excited to test with a proper weekend of camping. The cooler is a Dometic CFX3 35. It’s a smaller option in the CFX3 family, as I don’t need one of the massive offerings here. I’m pairing it with the Dometic PLB40, which is essentially a portable power station. Next, I plan to grab a portable solar kit and that along with the PLB40 should provide more than enough juice to keep the cooler running with no issue.

I snagged a pair of Darche Firefly chairs to toss in the back of the Montero as well. So slowly but surely Tony Montero is getting more ready than ever for weekend warrior-grade adventure. I’ll have more to report on the Dometic stuff very soon. That gear has been given to me for review purposes, so a disclaimer on that bit. All the rest of the stuff I’ve mentioned above I paid for myself.