Van Life in USA - meet Van Halen.

The most recent time that I spent back home in Missouri, USA led me directly to a beautiful opportunit; A neighbor’s beautiful old purple 1997 Dodge Ram Van, which she wanted to sell, shag carpet and all. I knew I wouldn’t be able to travel internationally for a while so I decided to buy the van, fix it up, and do a little bit of traveling in it for fun. It is my pleasure to introduce you to Van Halen. I bought the van from my neighbor and got to work. My friend and I took the seats out, reinforced the floor (which was rusted through in some places!), replaced the flooring, bolted down some furniture, had the inspections done, and started using this beauty as my tent. The cassette player never worked but I loved her all the same - usually with a Bluetooth speaker on the dash playing my favorite tunes. The best experience with Van Halen was driving through Rocky Mountain National Park, where I did a little bit of van-camping and hiking. The drive to Colorado from Missouri (about 12 hours) was the first test of the van’s strength and she performed beautifully, only needing some very minor parts replacements (some of the original rubber parts were literally crumbling from age). Van Halen is one of the quirkiest and goofiest risks I’ve ever taken with my travels and though I didn’t have her for long (I sold her when I left USA long-term again), she still burns brightly in my heart. I love that van and I love the memories of finding her, fixing her up, and blasting down the road with the windows open - ya know… since the AC didn’t always work. P.s. at the time I also had a daily driver for work; a Toyota Prius. Complementing Van Halen perfectly was my Judas Priust and we were a fleet.