It's been only a few weeks since I voiced my idea of lightweight RV-ing.
The idea is simple... we can spend years, even decades, waiting for "the right time" to buy a real RV, to try to go full-time, to ... experience any of it. I figured that waiting to take the total plunge without getting your feet wet is a bit of a gamble.
So a compromise came to me: Let me buy a van, throw a bed in it and go from there.
This seemed like a good idea...
and was relatively easy to fit into our budget and "mental justification". Definitely easier than a $100K RV.
Things snowballed pretty quickly though, and before long we were looking at conversion vans, and only high-tops at that. Main reasons for choosing a conversion van:
- Padded walls instead of bare metal (this may deter some customizers, but I wanted to actually use the thing and not just build)
- Pull-down blinds on windows for privacy (I'm going to sleep in this thing).
- Lighting and control panel(s) are already there
- TV/VCR (though these turned out to be less interesting for us in the end)
- Some overhead storage compartments, helpful
My list of changes quickly grew as well into:
- Bed. Preferrably folding but comfortable. Minimum width: 4 feet
- Sink. Yes, sink. With running water. Minimal fresh and gray (waste) containers.
- Toilet. Portable will do
- Better stereo with the following capabilities:
- MP3-CD
- Rear view camera display
- DVD with external outputs
- TV tuner
So we drove around and checked out the vans. Dodge RAM based vans seemed cheaper so I focused on them. A V8 was a must in case we decided to tow a trailer of some sort, either camper or luggage. I didn't want it too old and not too expensive, for me this was 8 years old. Before long, we found our match: a 1999 burgundy van with about 80K miles. $5500 later I had it on my driveway.
Now to enact modifications...
