We bought a van! Part I: The backstory

I know I’m not alone in having an unhealthy fascination obsession with #vanlife. I can’t trace it back to when it started, but once this obsession took hold, it really took hold. I found myself wanting a van--not so much to live in full-time (not yet, at least) but to use as a weekend/breaks/summer adventuremobile. Here in New England, #vanlife doesn’t seem to be as much a part of our fabric--RVs in the summer, yes, but vans? Not so much. But you know when you’re obsessed with something and then you start seeing that thing everywhere? Yeah, it was something like that. I’d be driving to work and staring at every painter’s van, delivery van, and any box-like wheeled structure on the road, and thinking, “ooh, that might work.”

My husband is quite used to my flights of fancy, usually paying little attention to the way my mind fixates on something and then conducts a deep dive filled with Internet rabbit holes down forums and hashtags and everything in-between. And so it was with the van. I researched and studied, lusted and lurked, until I settled (or so I thought) on what I wanted: a small (cute) van that would become the vehicle of our adventures. Think Ford Trasit, Ram Promaster City, etc. I looked at conversion kits and contacted companies. I set up countless accounts on car sites, all in the hopes of finding a sweet deal. All the while, my husband was probably thinking, “this too shall pass.” But it didn’t.

Then it hit me: would a small cargo van be too small? My father-in-law cautioned against getting a small van, and he had a point: I’d probably wish I had a little more space. But with more space would come more maneuvering, and I’m not a big-car-kind-of-girl. For someone who still has flashbacks of a failed driver’s test nearly 30 years ago, I didn’t want to drive around a tall, hulking vehicle that I wouldn’t feel in control of--at least not yet.

I looked at tow-behind options, but two main disadvantages immediately came to mind. The first, I didn’t want to tow anything. I find backing up difficult enough without the extra concern of a trailer. And, as a woman who might want to venture solo, I wanted to have something where I could easily skedaddle if I felt unsafe. Getting out of a trailer in order to access a vehicle didn’t lend itself to a quick get-the-hell-out-of-there opportunity. So, back to option #1: a van.

But a van would cost money, be a third vehicle for our two-parking-spot condo, and incur a bunch of other expenses beyond the initial expense (e.g., storage due to not having the extra parking space, registration, insurance, etc.). We (okay, I) settled on a rooftop tent. Now, mind you, we’re not big campers--we had camped a bit early in our marriage, but tentlife wasn’t necessarily calling to me in the way road travel and a more comfortable night’s sleep was. Let’s be honest, rooftop tents do look pretty kick-ass on the ‘gram. I measured mattress dimensions, taping out sections of our living room rug just to see how tight a fit it would be. I wondered about how much of a PITA it would be to take the tent on and off my car’s roof. All of these considerations were minor to the big one: my husband gets up at least half a dozen times per night. We sleep in a king bed now, and I wear sleepbuds at night. I feared I’d never get a full night’s sleep (he feared I’d blame him—he’s right!). And would he really want to go up and down a ladder multiple times per night? Probably not. I imagined him slipping on a slick ladder during the night, falling, hitting his head, and dying. Yeah, that’s how my mind works. So, back to obsessing over a van.

Like a lot of people whose childhood included Scooby Doo and The Partridge Family (and the cool van and bus in each), I lusted over VW vans. I imagined I’d be like Kevin Costner’s character in Field of Dreams, driving a VW Type 2 and listening to “Jessica” by the Allman Brothers as I drove across the country.

And so, to make a very long story short, we bought a 2002 silver Eurovan...my first-ever foray into the world of Craigslist. Up next: the purchase.