The Maiden Voyage ~by Carrie

 Is the van done? No.

Is it close to being done? Not really.

Did we take it camping anyways? Yes, we did!

We decided to take the van out for the night camping at a private campground. My sister and brother-in-law have a lot there, so if something went terribly wrong we wouldn’t be stranded.

The kayaks fit perfectly on the modified ladder rack. Tim is a genius when it comes to modifying and manufacturing things for the van. Our drive to the campgrounds was uneventful aka perfect. 

 

 

 

 

 Other take-a-ways from the trip:

1. zero regrets on leaving all the windows and having less storage. I absolutely loved being able to look out and see the river and trees from all directions.

   
   
   

2. We can actually fit a lot of stuff in the van. I was worried that all the kayak gear would take up too much room but I was surprised to discover I have room for more shoes, I mean camping gear.

3. It rained and nothing inside got wet! Van life is so much better than tent life!

4. Maybe this crazy idea to take a van from the wrecking yard, fix it up, and turn it in to a camper van wasn’t so crazy after all.

    

   ~Carrie 

Nice rack!

Found a ladder rack a while back on Facebook marketplace, (thank you Matt) and saved it along with a few others hoping the sellers would come down to a more reasonable price.

 

Well, our patience paid off! I decided to check my saved items to see what had sold, changed price or had been re-listed, and there it was; $1,300 was now down to $800. To top it off, this ladder rack looked almost new; it was already on an econoline van and local! I took a page out of my brother-in-law Chris' book and offered the guy $700 because he swears to never pay the asking price. "Offer accepted" I couldn't believe it! Set up a date, time and place to meet up to transfer the rack from his van to ours, and we are now the proud owners of an easy load ladder/soon to be kayak rack.

Got back to the shop and with a few easy couple days of work on the modifications and this is our result! I'm happy with the ease of loading and unloading and how it turned out overall.

Now to add a gear basket to the opposite side!

 

~Tim