Road Trip Essentials for Traveling in a Jeep

There are a few road trip essentials for traveling in a Jeep that we use on road trips. Our primary vehicle for traveling is our 2020 Jeep Gladiator.  On most trips, we pull our travel trailer behind it also.  As you can imagine, traveling as a family of five in this vehicle, leaves very little room for us to bring a bunch of stuff for everyone.

To help with that, we have put together our list of must have, road trip essential items when traveling, on road, in a Jeep Gladiator.  Some items are specific to the cab of the truck and others are for the bed, but together, they are a must.

Overall, this list is very important for us to stay organized, and sane, but also helps the kids with entertaining themselves along the way.

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Road Trip Essentials for Traveling in a Jeep

Seat Back Organizer with Molle Pouche

This may be the most important for us and the kids.  This bad boy, because of the molle sewn into it, allows us to attach various pouches that we use for the kids to carry some of their entertainment items such as Legos, action figures and small Dino toys to name a few.  This also holds their water bottles, maps and movie holder.

Dual DVD Players for Headrests

This DVD player was a game changer for us.  We made many trips from Missouri to Colorado prior to moving and this helped greatly with entertainment for the kiddos.  This particular one allows for one movie to be played on both screens or they can be used independently.  And when you have a teenage daughter and two younger boys, having this flexibility is great.  To add to these, we also purchased three of these headsets and one multi-headphone jack. (Amazon recommends their multi-headphone jack. We’ve never used it but the reviews are good.)

Dash Mount for Phone/GoPro

This mount replaces the rubber tray on the top of the dash and uses existing screws and holes so no additional drilling is needed.  This allows us to have our primary phone held securely in perfect location.  Our phone is what we use for navigation as we connect it to the Apple CarPlay.  Bulletpoint has a few different mounting options but this one seemed to be the most secure and fit the need closest.  It’s also expandable so you can add additional phone or camera mounts as well.

Grab Bar Tray

This little guy surprised us as to how much we used it.  It’s super convenient because you can access it very quickly.  Heather likes to keep her phone here but also has things like chapstick, pens and even park passes that we need handy.

First Aid Kit

Any traveler or overlander will tell you that you need some sort of First Aid Kit and they are correct.  You never know when you will need it.  We have this one and have used it quite a few times.  We added a few common things, as you would expect, such as Tylenol and a magnifying glass, but it is contains most of what you need right out of the box.

All Weather Floor Mats

Floor mats aren’t really a fun or exciting item but they help with my sanity.  When traveling, especially with 5 bladders, you are constantly stopping and getting in and out of the vehicle regardless of the conditions outside.  These floor mats protect the carpet from getting all of the water, dirt and/or mud that is brought into the vehicle.  These are the ones we have and are a great alternative to the more expensive Mopar ones.  They are basically the same but don’t have “Jeep” on them.

Tonneau Bed Cover

Owning and traveling in a Jeep Gladiator, we have to utilize the bed of the truck for bringing everything else we need for a trip.  Since buying our travel trailer, the bed doesn’t carry much but when we don’t pull the camper, this tonneau cover is essential.  I chose the Bestop brand knowing they supply Jeep with all of their soft tops from the factory as well as being located in Colorado.  I was expecting that it wouldn’t leak and it has met my expectations.  There are definitely cheaper options out there but I didn’t want to take any chances.  

Rtic Cooler

We have this 45qt cooler from Rtic.  It does a great job keeping its contents cold.  It will hold ice for a long time.  The longer the trip, the longer we will pre-chill it but going from the St. Louis area of Missouri into the heart of Colorado, we never ran out of ice.  We also have their 16oz coffee travel mug and their 30oz tumbler. All of their products have worked excellent for us.  We also bought the tray for cooler and we are so glad we did.  It will keep items like bread or eggs safe from the rest of the items in the cooler.

**Related Post: How long do Rtic coolers stay cold?

Storage Totes

These totes from Sterilite were critical to our travels.  These have the latching handles and kept its contents dust free and secure.  They fit perfectly under the tonneau cover.  We can fit four of these 18 gallon totes along with the Rtic cooler, a flat tote that contains our recovery gear and a smaller tote for dry food (that fits on top of our recovery gear tote).  There isn’t much room for anything else, mainly what can fit between the totes and the wall of the bed, but it has worked extremely well for us.

Bonus Items to consider

Door Organizer w/Cup Holder

Given that we have more kids than cup holders, we have considered adding a set of these.  To give the middle seat more room, there is an option to replace the cup holders for the back seats to give more foot room and these would help supplement the loss of those.

Center Console Organizer

Let’s be honest, who doesn’t need more organization in their center console.  In the Jeeps, they can be a black hole and find anything can be very difficult and frustrating.  This organizer is something we are considering adding to help with that.

Rear Overhead Storage Panel

This is another item we are considering adding.  This may not be the final choice because I can’t tell how easily it can be accessed from the top, but at a minimum, we would be able to add more molle pouches if we found that necessary as well.  I have also found rear side mount molle panel solutions from JCR, that I would consider, as well.

Rear Power Outlet

If you are like us, our Jeep did not come with the package for USB/power outlets in the rear seat area.  And, let’s face it, the more ports for charging devices, is always beneficial and why this may be a future add for our Jeep also.

Wrap up

Hopefully, this list of road trip essentials for traveling in a Jeep helps you out as much as it has for us.  We have many travel plans for the future and these items will be essential for those trips.  Safe travels!