A brief history of my vans

When I was 18 I owned my first car, a 1972 Volkswagen Beetle. It was a great car and I traveled extensively in it. Why I didn't choose a van as my first wheels, I have no clue but it wasn't long before I decided that I should have. I scoured the newspapers, the auto trader magazines and a new tool that I was beginning to learn called the Internet to try and find my first van. As an established VW fan the choice was clear, a VW bus. My first VW bus was a 73 camper that I purchased from a stoner in Ohio. It was a mess and the engine was sitting on the back seat. The price was cheap and with more enthusiasm than sense, I bought it. Despite his hesitations, my dad rented a Uhaul and a trailer and we went and hauled it straight to the yard of a local VW shop that I had begun to haunt. There it would stay until the day the shop closed and it was hauled to the scrap yard with all the other junkers out back. Just before I left the shop for the last time, I wrote 'Casual Turtle' on the front of the van with a sharpie. I never drove it, but still it was my first van and I thought it should receive the honor of making its last journey with a name.



The beetle sold and some cash in hand I began my search again. I came home with a 72 camper that actually drove. It was rough, but operable. It was a standard Westfalia interior with the folding bed, sink and table. From the moment I put the key into the ignition to drive it home it was far more than another vehicle, it was my first apartment. I immediately set about customizing it to suit me. I recovered the seats with tie dye and made curtains to match. My mother worked all her sewing magic to make a custom tie dyed canvas top for the pop up, something I was tremendously proud of since I never saw another like it. I covered the folding table with a US road map and plastered the windows with stickers. It was home. I took many trips with it, including a 4 month stretch of living in it while traveling all over the east coast. I hung onto it long after it stopped running and it was eventually sold to someone who, I hope, got it back on the road. The Casual Turtle 2 will always have a special place in my heart.



During the Casual Turtle 2 days I was attending community college. In the campus library one day I stumbled on a book that captivated me. The Do-It-Yourself Custom Van Book by Franklynn Peterson and Judi R Kesselman. It was a 1977 how-to manual for customizing a van produced at the height of the 70's custom van craze. It was very detailed in its instruction even going as far as how to lay out parts on a sheet of plywood to minimize waste. I checked it out, paid for it as if it was lost, and still have it to this day. When the VW bus stopped running properly, I stored it at a relatives and began a stint of driving my late grandmother's old Plymouth Horizon all the while dreaming of the next van. I poured through that book over and over and when some cash found its way into my pocket, I became the proud owner of a 1985 Ford Econoline. The Casual Turtle 3 was born. I built the interior from scratch, largely from plans in the book. I had it painted in green with a custom white stripe across the hood and down the side. It was my pride and joy and was played a large role in the beginning of my relationship with the woman who would become my wife (not like that, get your mind out of the gutter). It was my mobile apartment where we could spend time alone and get to know each other in addition to taking many road trips together. I spent all the money I had replacing the motor when it seized up from blown oil line (the oil light is no help if the bulb is burned out, so check them often). When the transmission went I had no money to fix it and it was taken to a small car lot my grandfather was the landlord of. It was sold to a man who wanted to take it to Nashville and live in while he followed his dream of becoming a country singer. That man lived in the van right on the car lot for several months before a fire in the office trailer claimed it along with several other cars. A computer crash cost me all but one picture of the van's interior in its completed state, the picture on the 'for sale' flyer I had made for it.

The Casual Turtle 4 was a short lived 88 Astrovan that only made one successful road trip before major recurring electrical problems took it off the road. The interior was nothing more than a futon mattress layed in the back.

My Current van is a 1978 GMC Vandura. I purchased it from the original owner who customized it with van catalog accessories in the waining years of the van craze. I have used it mostly in the state I purchased it. It has a tough reliable drive train attached to a rats nest of an electrical system. It has been on several road trips so far and is currently sitting in storage in South Carolina awaiting some funds to repair its molested wires. Its interior will be redesigned and rebuilt from the ground up, so stay tuned for that.

Although not a member of the Casual Turtle family, honorable mention goes to 'Working Class Zero' my 93 Dodge C/V (the cargo model of the Caravan). It is my work truck and daily driver. With a quarter of a million miles on the clock it is approaching retirement. It will be replaced by the redesign of the Casual Turtle 5 which will incorporate both living and working functions into its layout. The little dodge is a beast and has earned a lot of respect from me.

an old cargo vehicle, or a window into the soul?

What is vanning anyways?

I'm sure that like anything, it depends on who you ask. Basically though, vanning is an interest in customizing and traveling in vans. It's a fairly straightforward hobby that pupated in the 60's, spread its wings and fluttered joyfully through the 70's and then died in the 80's splattered across the windshield of a wood paneled Jeep Grand Cherokee.

Like the phoenix, vanning would rise from its own ashes and transform itself from a shag carpet covered fad into a die hard subculture of people who saw something more. There was something more there than just a big custom car with room for airbrushed murals and velvet covered beds. There was a vehicle that could transform the very way a person lived and perceived the world.

I took an interest in vans even before I really noticed them as a vehicle. I was the kid that would scour the neighborhood trash, waiting for someone to buy a new refrigerator or washing machine so I could drag the empty box home and haul it up into my room. I would draw dials and controls all over the inside and put my radio and sleeping bag in. I would sneak out of my bed at night so I could sleep in the box that I had made all my own. Something in me preferred the small space. Inside there, everything was how I wanted it, and it all made sense to me.

I had always loved to travel. Some of my earliest and fondest memories are of family road trips from Pittsburgh to visit relatives in New Jersey or Maryland. Predawn departures, CB radio chatter, watching the scenery fly by all captivated me. I always got such a kick out of making up my little bed in the back seat to sleep during the drive. The back seat became my own personal house for the duration of the voyage. I watched the Muppet Movie over and over on our Beta max, lusting over the idea of a cross country journey and of seeking my fortune on the open highway.

When I was young, my mother worked for a plumber. I recall one day being in the back of one of the company's brand new Chevy Astrovans. It was still empty, without racks of parts and tools. I was probably around 8 or somewhere around that. I remember being in the back of that empty van, looking at the open space around me and thinking for the first time "Hey, I could live in here.". I have never looked at a van again without thinking the same thing.

It's that concept of a small efficient and mobile home that drives the vanning subculture today. Inside the back of a van, everything is usually installed, arranged and maintained by the person who occupies it. Everything makes sense and can be dealt with in a way that most people can't apply to large complex home. Above it all is the sense of freedom. To be able to drive anywhere and always have your little home right behind you. The freedom to explore at will without having to worry about where you would sleep that night. It's a lifestyle of simplicity and self sufficiency that provides more security than many people could ever fathom. John Steinbeck wrote in Travels with Charley of his camping truck, saying that he was "a kind of casual turtle, carrying his house on his back." That line always stuck with me and I am currently on my 5Th van named "The Casual Turtle 5".

The internet has lead me to know of others out there who share this philosophy and embrace this lifestyle either full time or part time. This blog is my attempt to join in and become an active part of this online community of van dwellers. To share what I have learned and to learn what others have to share with me on the subject. To stoke the embers of a passion that more than any other in my life has defined who I am.

So you've decided to blog...

Let me get one thing out of the way to start with, I don't like the term "blog". It doesn't sound right coming off the tongue, and it lacks legitimacy as a contraction. My reluctance to ever start a blog of my own came largely from my aversion to the word itself. However, a resolution to begin writing again, and the fact that I am unlikely to uproot the word blog from popular culture have brought me here.

There are things swimming around in my head, thoughts, memories, aspirations and fears, that shape the way I see the world. As much for myself as for anyone who may read this, I have decided to use the all powerful interweb to lay out some of those synaptic pearls in an order that may begin to make some sense.

But what to write about...

Without choosing a theme for my blog it would descend into chaos. A post about a passionate political issue on Monday followed on Tuesday by a rant about how some canned foods stack better than others. Not that my writings (and the thoughts that produce them) will ever fall into a sensible order, but at least with a central subject uniting them it may not be as scary.

There are many things that I am passionate about and many more things that interest me (see my profile for a taste), but above all, there has been one area of interest that has defined my outlook more than any other.

Vanning.