My 4Runner TRDORP is just over a year old and I'm getting ready for my second bigger adventure in her (and many smaller adventures over the past year as well!). Last fall I did a 3-week trip around Wyoming & Montana on my own, just sleeping in the back of the 4Runner every night. I hadn't done any kind of storage or sleeping platform in the 4Runner at that point. I just had a Costco 3" memory foam mattress doubled up on one side and a bunch of bins on the other side.
This year's adventure will be half family and half exploring on my own. Which means that I cannot remove the 2nd row seat bottoms and leave them at home... which for 5th gen 4Runners is a requirement for having a long enough sleeping space in the back. So I did my first, super simple storage & sleeping system for the back. We'll seen a couple weeks how well it works out for me!
Sorry for the crappy video... and I said goodbye then realized that I wanted to add some parts... but, it is what it is!
I'm not quite done yet... I think I'm going to add a shorter storage space on the left in the back to put the cooler on and be able to store some flat things under it. Then I'll be done for now. Need to find some bins of the right size for the right side. Worst, I end up making some, but hopefully I can find something. The size of the storage compartment was entirely dictated by the height of the folded down seat bottoms and the width of my Exped sleeping mat!
Nice work, and thanks for posting! I appreciate it when people post their travel solutions. My wife and I love traveling via 4Runner to Glacier, Yellowstone, and the Rockies in general. We have a 16 year old son with Down Syndrome, so any 'convenience' solutions appeal to me.