The brand recently launched the 28L TravelR 30 ($250), a tall-standing and oval-shaped soft cooler with generous space. But we wish the side mesh water bottle pockets were hardy like the rest of the cooler — they felt flimsy and easily snagged. Also, we loved that the top entry opened wide and had a two-way zipper, though the wide rim made drying out the igloo soft cooler cooler a challenge. The Hydro Flask Day Escape Tote ($150) offers a streamlined, lightweight, and durable design. We used this cooler for park BBQs and loved how comfortable it was to slip over our shoulders and carry. The two side handles aren’t the most comfortable to grab, and we wish they weren’t adjacent to the shoulder straps’ attachment points.
While the Boss is very durable and comfy to carry, it didn’t do as well in ice and cold retention compared to Yeti’s Hopper BackFlip backpack cooler. Some 24 hours after we put ice in the coolers, the inside temperature of the Boss increased by 19 degrees compared to just 7 degrees in the Yeti. And where the Yeti still had about half of its ice frozen, our testers reported only about 20 percent of the ice placed in the Icemule stayed frozen. We love that this cooler has handles and backpack straps, making it ideal for different carrying methods. And we dig the bonus features like side pockets, webbing to attach gear to, and an attached bottle opener. Despite the product’s claim to be a leakproof cooler, we did have some leaking.
So we used a different shoulder strap to carry the cooler on our 15-minute walk to our picnic spot. The cooler’s exterior is made with stout ripstop nylon that easily wipes down. The Igloo Pursuit Tote ($100) preserved our bubbly water, hummus, pepperoni, peppers, and arugula while car camping and crewing the Hardrock 100. For grab-and-go, there’s a handle on the back and a carry tote-style strap.
You can easily roll it from the parking lot to the beach, or detach it and sling it over your shoulder. Ace Rewards members are eligible to receive free delivery on orders of $50 or more. Mission TUKO Microfiber Sport Towel
Dry off quickly with Mission’s TUKO Microfiber towels. These towels absorb more water than igloo trailmate cotton and stow small, saving valuable space on the boat or in your bag… For web orders returned in store, please take the item in original packaging, along with invoice to any
Camping World retail locations for a refund or exchange. Refunds
are issued to the original form of payment; some exclusions may apply.
If your fingers can compress the foam more than 75%, you’re probably dealing with open-cell foam. If the foam feels denser than that and doesn’t compress much at all, you probably have your hands on closed-cell foam. Other Features
A few other notable features to be on the lookout for include integrated bottle openers and vacuum ports for adding or releasing air. ICEMULE’s Classic has a similar valve system, although in this case, the process involves adding air to boost cooling capabilities and buoyancy and removing it to compress the cooler down for storage.
But when the handgrip is detached into two separate pieces, they’re not comfortable to grasp. The Snow Peak Soft Cooler did well on a weekend road trip to climb in Colorado’s Sangre de Cristo Mountains and camp out, but wouldn’t be able to retain ice for longer durations. Our ice retention test corroborated that experience, showing the cooler is capable of holding ice for nearly 2.5 days. But the flexible walls allowed us to flatten and fold the cooler for easy storage, saving us space in a tight apartment. The Arctic Zone Titan Bucket Tote ($53) is a great budget cooler that keeps our ice cold for long durations. A trio took the cooler fly fishing on Colorado’s Gunnison River, carrying along water and various canned beverages.
For being so small, it is expensive for the average consumer, despite its quality construction. The Arctic Zone Titan Deep Freeze 60 proved to us that soft coolers can hang with their hard-shelled counterparts. Right off the bat, we liked the fact that the Titan Deep Freeze comes with a detachable rolling cart. Additionally, some insulated cooler bags also have internal compartments that store both chilled and non-chilled items.