It is a silly question but as far as I know this hasn't been discussed much here. I was looking around and didn't find much--please direct me if incorrect.
I have been thinking the past few days of how safe car camping is or roof top tents really are and since I don't have much first hand experience in the USA or in other countries, I'm hoping others can put in their experiences and or knowledge. When I talk about safety, I'm not speaking so much about the physical aspects of sleeping in a car with fumes or the failure of the roof top tent-I'm talking about safety from animals. Aside from crazy people that are always a danger when camping(or living our daily lives for that matter), we have nature to deal with. Here in the US of course different dangers than those oversees. We have bears, mountain lions/panthers, wolves, etc. Other countries have lions, elephants, cheetahs, hyenas and more. I was really wanting to know how safe we really are camping in our cars in these environments such as Alaska where 10 foot or taller bears rome. Obviously if they want in our car, they can break the window, if they want in the tent, they can reach it. Wolves, mountain lions, etc can climb the roof or jump however I'm not sure they feed in the same way as bears, since they are more predatory, catch their prey by surprise type. However I am also aware that many of these attacks that happen are because the animal smells food somewhere inside the vehicle or tent.
Oversees, they have lions and all those mentioned above. Since I've never camped anywhere but the states I can only imagine a lot of this is my imagination but I'd be a little scared sleeping in my roof top tent in the middle of the jungle or the plains of Africa.
What are your thoughts on this? I understand that if it's gonna happen, it's gonna happen but when I hear something outside the tent, I'd rather not think it was something coming to eat my wife and I. Do those of you that have done a lot of car and/or roof top tent camping find that animals stay clear of the vehicle or have you felt threatened at any time from wildlife?
Are there any advantages in safety between camping in the car versus rtt?
Hopefully this made some sense!
Thanks. RG