Three Wheels Good, But Are You Dry?

So there I was, cruising up the motorway, when what should whizz past but a chrome-clad symbol of impractical valour – a motorised trike, dressed like a Road Captain from an American retirement fantasy, towing a solitary teardrop caravan no bigger than a large coffin with ideas above its station. At first glance – I’ll admit it – it looked cool. Like something a postman in Mad Max might use on his day off.

But once you get past the novelty and the sun-glinting-off-the-aluminium moment, you realise this thing is basically a Romahome that’s gone on a bender and joined a biker gang.

Let’s break it down. You’ve got three wheels, no cabin insulation, exposed to the elements like a Victorian mill worker on a lunch break, and towing what amounts to a glorified aluminium slug on casters. Yes, it may scream freedom – until the M6 spits rain sideways into your open-faced helmet and you start questioning all your life choices since buying that £200 leather waistcoat. It’s the sort of setup that says: “I want to camp like it’s still 1963, but with more back pain.”

Contrast this with the humble Romahome. Not sexy, I grant you. No one has ever looked at a Romahome and thought, Yes – that’s the vehicle of a renegade outlaw who probably has a snake tattoo. But it’s dry. It’s warm. You can make a cup of tea without having to towel off your eyebrows first. You don’t need to pack your panniers with tarpaulin, hope, and a prayer. And if it chucks it down (this being Britain, of course it will), you’re not climbing into a metal seedpod soaked through and covered in grit like some sort of soggy hermit crab.

This trike-rig is performative roughing-it – like someone cosplaying hardship while actually carrying a credit card with “Adventure” written in Helvetica Bold on the back. It’s the vehicular equivalent of an Instagram influencer ‘wild camping’ three feet from a lay-by.

And the irony? The Romahome owner is probably already parked up at a pub with proper plumbing, eating a hot pasty off real crockery, while the Trike Crusader is still trying to wrestle his mini-ark into a lay-by without it toppling over in the crosswind.

Yes, it looks cool at first glance – but then again, so did the Sinclair C5.

Give me weatherproof and unsexy over soggy heroics any day.

This, however, is a better idea: