A Tale of Van Buying Misadventures: Our Story
After four years, three vans, a truck camper, a school bus, and a stray cow, we are finally engaged in the lifestyle that we have worked so hard to achieve. In the spirit of sharing our tribulations when it comes to achieving van life, we hope that this article will provide you with some tips on how to choose the right van for a life on the open road. If you are completely new to the world of vans, and are still struggling to get an idea of what you can do with your budget, then take a look at our post about The Best Van for Van Life where we go through all the different types of vans that you can buy. Of course, you can always skip ahead, and read this post before jumping to that article.
In a crudely small nut shell the answer to the title question is: the first van you see that is in your budget, and in good running condition. We would have saved thousands, and been travelling a lot sooner if we had followed that simple advice.
The VW Crafter Van
Visiting Hammerhavn Harbour on Bornholm, Denmark in our VW Crafter
Our van life journey was off to an excellent start when we bought a 2018 VW Crafter for only 30,000 EUR, with less than 40,000km on it. Of course those were the days when we all thought that Corona was just a really bland beer, so van prices were still within the reach of mortals who were not blessed with a trust fund. The only kicker was that we did not have the confidence in ourselves yet to complete the conversion on our own, so we found a UK based company that could do it for us. Back in those days, there were far fewer van conversion companies, and the only German ones we could find were specialised in VW Transporters (T4, T5, T6 etc).
Everything was going well until we ran into a cash crunch, getting ripped off by a contractor whilst doing a full renovation in a foreign country is surprisingly expensive, so we made the decision to sell the van. This was quite tough, as we had already done some mini van life trips to Bornholm Denmark, where we used the van to sleep in so that we didn’t have to drive for 16 hours straight. Nonetheless the decision was made, and it sold for a good price, so when the lockdowns first started we naively thought that we had been really clever. A word to the wise; never ever think that you have been clever, because unlike sharks that only bite when you touch their private parts (obscure reference to the movie ‘50 First Dates’), cleverness will bite you no matter what.
Van Purgatory
With lockdowns over, and a few more months of savings underneath our belt, we were determined not to spend the summer in the same surroundings again. With that in mind we made the decision to just buy a regular motorhome, and not bother with the whole van conversion process, so that we could hit the road as soon as possible. Full of determination we jumped onto the auto classified site to look for our new motorhome, and were completely and utterly flabbergasted. Motorhomes that had been selling for 40,000 EUR before the lockdown, were now asking over 60,000 EUR. Not only was that completely out of our budget, but out of sheer stubborn principle, I also refused to support that sort of price gouging. After spending weeks in van purgatory which involved far too many hours of discussions about what sort of camper we could buy, what we could afford, and even more hours sifting through the classifieds, we once again tried to be clever.
The VW California Camper Van
Getting ready to sell the VW California
In our lockdown addled minds we decided that squeezing three dogs, one of them being a 40 kg German Shepherd, and two cats into a VW California camper for a summer trip to Scandinavia, would be the bees knees. We found a great looking VW California camper for sale in Switzerland, that was within our budget, and had fairly low km’s on it. I briefly test drove it, and then called Sita from the dealership parking lot to check that we wanted to go ahead. It was during that call that we first uttered the fateful words ‘what is the alternative?’. If you, my dear readers, blissfully skim over every other sage piece of wisdom in this article, please remember this; there is always an alternative, the alternative is to do nothing! Alas at that time we were less wise, and despite our apprehensions we bought the camper van.
Our first trip with the van was a visit to my Father at his house in the quaint village of Sorenberg in Switzerland. After a pleasant dinner, we retired to the camper, and began the process of folding down the backseat, and adding the mattress topper so that it became a bed. Of course upon folding out the backseat, all the floor space largely disappeared, and poor Dundee ended up stuck, and confused between the front seats. Poodle always sleeps on our bed, so he found his place quickly. Mezzo enjoyed the cave-like atmosphere of the passenger footwell, so he was also perfectly comfortable. That still left Dundee feeling a bit homeless, with no floor space left for him to properly stretch out. The only option was to put him on the bed as well, although given the small nature of the lower bed, it meant that I was relegated to the bed in the pop top. I suspect that it is needless to say, but it was not a pleasant or comfortable night, and one look at each other in the morning was all that was needed to know that this was not the right camper for us.
At this point I welcome, and encourage all of you dear readers to yell at the screen, and utter your choice of phrases in the vein of ‘well of course it was going to be a mistake you daft fools with the brain of a newt!’. We attempted one more day trip in the VW California to confirm our conclusion, and realised that it was impossible to fold the built in table up or down, without kicking Dundee out of the van first. It was the final nail in the proverbial coffin, and the very next day I took the van out for a drive, and found somewhere pretty to take pictures for the ad. Luckily for us, the van sold extremely quickly, with multiple people interested, so at the end of the day we actually made a small profit.
The Bigfoot Truck Camper
Camping in the Bigfoot truck camper in Banff National Park, Canada
Later in that year of excellent ideas I came up with the brilliant plan of moving back to Canada, and buying a truck and truck camper set up. Yes, this was still during the pandemic with random lockdowns, and countless nonsensical travel restrictions in place. Somehow I managed to convince Sita that selling our beautiful hill top house in Switzerland, putting all our furniture into storage, and flying across the atlantic with our three dogs, and cat, was the best way to ensure a future of travelling the world in our own vehicle.
I shall refrain from boring you with all the details, but after some back and forth with a few different dealers we succeeded in buying a beautiful 2020 Ford Super Duty F 350 4×4 in Canada. We got really lucky, and were able to take advantage of the Ford Canada Employee Pricing promotion, which meant that we could order a new truck for pretty much the same price as a used one. We did have to wait six months for it, but since we were not even in Canada yet, that was not of particular concern.
Our Ford F350 in Alberta, Canada
After overcoming the hurdles of flying internationally with pets – take a look at our article on how to fly with pets for a detailed guide – and surviving the mind numbing two weeks of quarantine, we were finally free to explore Canada. The only downside was that we had arrived in early December, and Alberta has a terrible habit of becoming absolutely freezing in the winter. Nevertheless, the dogs enjoyed playing in the snow whilst we were in quarantine, and we had succeeded in buying our first truck camper during those two weeks as well, a 2020 Bigfoot 10.4. The only slight hitch was that we had to pick up the camper in British Columbia, but we had a gorgeous, comfortable truck to complete the ride in, so it was hardly a chore.
A few days later after setting up the truck camper, we were ready to camp in it for the first time. Sita found a provincial recreation area, situated next to a lake in Kelowna, where we could park up. After driving through deep snow, and being grateful for having 4×4 we parked up for the night, ready to camp in our camper for the first time. The wind was blowing strong, and the temperature had dropped to -40 Celcius, but we were able to stay warm by blasting the furnace. We spent three days by the lake, before our two gas canisters were empty, and we ended up on a mission to find somewhere to refill them. Luckily there was a Costco in Kelowna, so it ended up being a fairly simple mission. The drive also recharged the single AGM leisure battery. After another day of freezing our derrieres off, and our battery running down, we gave up for a bit and got a hotel room for a few days. It was wonderful being able to take a hot shower, and not have to worry about the gas running out during the night. It also gave us time to reflect, we were not loving the truck camper, the bed was freezing at night despite cranking the heat, the leisure battery was almost useless, and the furnace was drinking natural gas like it was happy hour.
Our first night attempting to live full time in an RV (in -40 Celsius)
We made our way back towards Calgary, and checked in at the Banff National Park campground, initially only for a couple of days to recharge the battery, and empty our tanks. A few days turned into almost two weeks during which we enjoyed revisiting our favourite hikes, and had some long discussions about the improvements we wanted to make to the truck camper, to make it off grid capable, and more comfortable for us to live in full time. Unfortunately the outcome of those discussions was that we would have to spend almost CAD 10,000 to have a professional upgrade the electrical system with a victron inverter, and lithium batteries. We also wanted to replace the natural gas furnace with a diesel heater, to eliminate the hassle of having to always find natural gas. After looking at our truck camper specifications online, we realised that Bigfoot had neglected to put a heating vent in the bed area, normally a standard feature. This finally explained why we were always freezing in bed. The manufacturer would add in a heating vent for free, and the dealership would pay for the fuel to drive there, so that problem was easily solved. However, after looking online at what similar truck campers were selling for there was no way that we could justify spending the money needed to make it off grid capable. If we had bought the truck camper used, this would not have been as big a deal, but with the camper being brand new we would be in a huge financial hole once you took depreciation into consideration.
We found an airbnb in Calgary where we could take some time to determine what our next steps were going to be. The excellent plan that I had hatched back in Switzerland, when we still had our beautiful hill top house, was beginning to develop some serious cracks, some might even go so far as to say that the plan had failed. Nevertheless, fate favours the brave, and all that sort of motivational speak, and I was busy coming up with the next most cunning, and excellent plan. The first step was to list the truck, and truck camper for sale, although given that it was the middle of the winter, the chances of it selling were fairly slim. Sita really wanted a van again, but we had also come to appreciate having the 4×4 in the truck when driving in winter conditions. After sending out a huge amount of emails to every single dealership in British Columbia and Alberta, we put a deposit down on a new extra long wheelbase Ford Transit with AWD that was scheduled to arrive at the dealership in a couple of months. Before we could take delivery of the Transit though, I had found some videos on shuttle bus conversions, and had begun to develop a new idea that would save us money, give us more space, and take us on an adventure to the US.
The School Bus
Buying a school bus to convert to a camper van in New York State
Despite the numerous logistical challenges we eventually made it to the US in one piece, and began the search for a shuttle bus. This ultimately ended up involving a lot of wasted money, and time as I flew around the country trying to find the right bus. Although I gained a huge amount of knowledge from talking to a variety of people that specialised in buses, I would probably recommend using a service like we go look that can view the bus for you and give you a video. This would have saved me a lot of money on hotels, rental cars, and plane tickets.
Eventually I found a 2009 School Activity Bus, essentially a school bus built on a van chassis. School Activity Buses are better than shuttle buses because they have to meet the same crash, and safety standards as the large school buses. In contrast, shuttle buses are built to be as cheap as possible in order to win contracts. The kicker was that this bus was located in upstate New York, and we were currently in Houston, Texas. Luckily aeroplanes have been invented so I made the journey to go buy our future bus. Of course being from New York the bus had more rust than I had seen in the pictures, but it was largely surface rust that could be treated. With the stop sign removed, and everything that said school taped over, I was ready to begin the long drive back to Houston, so we could begin converting it into a tiny camper home on wheels.
The school bus broke down right after buying it!
The universe evidently had a different opinion, and less than one hour from the dealership the whole bus began to fill with smoke, forcing me to pull over. Not sure of what else to do I called the dealership, who were kind enough to send a tow truck. The next morning the dealership informed me that it was a coolant line that had broken off. They assured me that it was fixed, but after being stranded on the side of the road immediately after buying the bus I was less than convinced. After a lot of back and forth with several managers, and dropping the word ‘lemon’ into the conversation, the dealership agreed to take back the bus, refund my money, and also pay for my trip back to Houston.
The Mercedes Sprinter Van
Taking a trip to Playa Agua Calienete in Baja, Mexico
Safely back in Houston, Sita made it clear that there would be serious consequences if I dared to utter the words ‘cunning plan’ one more time. She wanted a newer van that we could convert into a camper van ourselves with the help of YouTube. Given my excellent track record of coming up with clever plans, and having them fail, I readily agreed. After several hours sifting through autotrader we found a lightly used 2020 Mercedes Sprinter for sale in Ohio. Not exactly around the corner from Houston, but it was the best deal to be had in the entire continental US, at a time when every man, woman, and dog wanted to do a van conversion. The journey to pick up the Sprinter was a lot easier, and went a lot smoother than the school bus journey. The van was clean, and ready to go when I arrived, and after a quick test drive I was fully convinced on the merits of buying a van. After signing the paperwork, and handing over a lot of money, I began the long journey south with a short stop in New Orleans to pick up some Beignets.
We swiftly began the process of converting the empty van into a camper, although with only one month left on our tourist visa, it was definitely a race against the clock. Despite our best efforts, we did not manage to finish the van conversion in the time we had left. We completed the flooring, installed two maxx air fans, solar panels, and windows but did not get around to any of the interior furniture. With our visa for the US expiring, we had to make a decision about whether to go back to Canada or head south to Baja, Mexico. Going back to Canada would mean another two weeks of quarantine, which did not sound appealing, but if we travelled to Mexico we would have to wait for the US border to open again, before we could get back to Canada. Ultimately we made the decision to head south, thinking that if the US border didn’t open we could always just keep going further south.
Working on the Sprinter van conversion. We just finished installing the Maxxair fans.
We took full advantage of our first month in Baja, sitting on the veranda of our airbnb drinking beer, and eating copious amounts of nacho chips, and homemade salsa. We tried working on the camper van a few times, but with temperatures beginning to hit 40 degrees celsius, it was not pleasant. At last we pulled ourselves together, and moved to an airbnb in La Paz, so that we could be closer to the Home Depot there. The only glitch was that the lumber stores in town did not have any good quality plywood. A quick Google search showed what looked to be some good lumber stores in Los Cabos, a 2 hour drive south. Since the only Costco in Baja was in Cabos as well, and we had run out of nacho chips, it seemed like a good way to make the drive more productive.
Half of the lumber stores in Cabos that I had found on Google Maps were not open, and the ones I did find had a fairly poor selection of materials. My trip to Costco was successful though, and I stocked up the van with everything we could possibly need for the next month. All my time searching for lumber stores had added up, so I would have to spend some time driving in the dark. We had read warnings about not driving during the night in Mexico, and it was not the original plan, but since we had already done it a few times with no issues, I wasn’t concerned for my safety.
I had almost made it back to our airbnb, and was about to drive into the suburbs of La Paz, when a cow suddenly appeared at the edge of the light from my headlamps. I slammed on the brakes, fought the ABS, and tried to very gently steer away from the cow. With a loud smash, I knew I had not succeeded in missing the cow. Heart pumping, and nervous about what I was going to see, I pulled over, and got out of the van to make sure no other cars would hit the cow. Thankfully I had only side swiped the cow. By the time I had gotten out of the van, it had gotten back up, and was lumbering towards the fields that lined the highway. Luckily the van was still drivable, and the airbag had not deployed.
Damage to the Mercedes Sprinter van
The next morning we surveyed the damage, and called the insurance company. We had made sure to purchase comprehensive coverage for our Mexican insurance policy, so we weren’t overly concerned about the cost to fix the damage. However, due to the lack of parts for the new model Sprinter in Mexico, the insurance adjuster strongly recommended that we get the damage repaired in the US. A month later, and after some significant logistical challenges, we were able to get ourselves, the pets, and the van back to the US.
Ultimately everything worked out well for us, we found a top notch body shop in Los Angeles, who we could leave the van with, and arranged with the fantastic guys at Pop Top Overland in San Diego that they would sell the van, including all the items we had bought for the conversion, once it was done being repaired by the body shop.
The Mercedes Vario Van
Finally living van life!
A few months later, we ended up back in Europe, this time in Northern Sweden, and began to convert another van. Read about this van buying ‘adventure’ in the post What to Look for When Buying a Mercedes Vario for a Van Conversion. This time we were successful, and finally learned from all the mistakes we made in the past four years. We are now happily travelling in our self converted camper van, and have already had some crazy, fun, challenging, and inspiring adventures in Turkey, Georgia and Greece.
Looking back at this wild chapter of our lives has been quite tough, it is extremely easy to be self critical when you have the benefit of knowing the outcome of events. However, it is also extremely unfair to beat yourself up over past decisions that you thought were right for you at the time. On the one hand we wish we could have avoided the stress, and difficulties of our year in N. America, but at the same time it also made us stronger, more determined, and better able to overcome future challenges. From now on though we are done with cunning plans, sometimes the simplest plan is really the best plan.
For helpful tips on what kind of van to buy, check out the post 5 Questions You Must Answer Before Buying a Camper Van for Van Life.
