Wagon vs Cart
How do I carry all that beach stuff? Beach chairs, umbrellas, cooler, towels, toys, tent........ all that beach stuff adds up. Its hard to carry all of it, will a wagon or cart carry it all? We took on this challenge this week to determine what is the best method to carry all that beach stuff.
WAGON We used the extra large Cowboys wagon purchased from Costco with the large plastic wheels. The wagon was large enough to easily carry 5 beach chairs, 4 folding chairs, umbrella, beach bag, toys, and miscellaneous beach stuff. It easily pulled on the pool decking surface, easy to wash off the sand on the wheels. It had large pockets to hold drinks, and items. It easily folded by pulling the tab in the middle and folded small enough to store/pack. It did accumulate some sand in the wagon itself from items not cleaned appropriately, and was a little difficult getting the sand out. The main problem was that once you hit the soft powder white sand, the front wheels were only dragging and not turning causing the wagon to be VERY difficult to pull. Even when the wagon was empty, the front wheels only dragged in the sand. The back wheels would roll.
CART We used the Rio Beach Cart purchased from Amazon with large plastic wheels in the back and small swivel wheels in the front. Instructions say to push the cart with 4 wheels on hard surfaces and pull the cart with 2 wheels in soft sand. The cart easily held 4 folding chairs and 5 beach chairs, beach toys, towels, umbrella, and miscellaneous beach stuff. It easily pushed on the pool decking surface, was easy to wash off the sand on the wheels. It had a large compartment that held my phone, keys, shirt, drink, and other items. It took a little exploring to learn how to fold the cart and position the pockets. It has a net bag to hold most of the folding chairs and some beach items, a bar to hold the beach chairs, and umbrella holder to hold an umbrella, and the sand easily passed to the bottom and we wiped the sand off the bottom easily. Again this was not easy to pull through the sand, but it was easier than the wagon. One person or 2 people could easily hold onto the bar and pull through the sand. The cart was light weight, and easier to pull empty. The cart did not have the capacity to hold a cooler or a beach tent.
Conclusion: We kept the Rio Beach Cart and returned the Wagon. While on the beach, I noticed some families had wagons, some had beach carts, some had tents and some had umbrellas and chairs. I have to say, I was disappointed in the wagons performance. I had high hopes that this would be the answer to carrying the tent, chairs, cooler, and other beach items, but this was not the case. For a family of 5 the beach cart can easily carry 5 beach chairs or 5 folding chairs, beach toys, umbrella, towels and other beach items, but you will likely have to have other people carry the tent and the cooler. This week we had family and friends gathering at the beach. We really pushed the maximum capacity of the beach cart and the wagon to the limits.
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We have found the same issues. We finally settled on a Little Tikes wagon. It holds as much as the beach wagon, is washable (has a hole for drainage), and can do double duty pulling kids on a walk with built in seating. And it holds a ton of stuff without the kiddos in there. But anything is better than shlupping all your stuff to the beach without help!
I agree! After seeing beach chairs, carts, and tents strapped to all the cars driving back home, I know our guest appreciate not having to pack all the beach stuff.