Some of the research we came across showed people converting their SUV’s into little campers. We look at each other, “WE have an SUV”, we thought. Before investing in a van, we thought trying out the lifestyle on a small scale would give us a taste for what it was like.

And so we built a platform for our bed, bought a single burner propane stove and in July 2019, set off for Atlantic Canada. Our plan was to sleep in the car for a day or two, then find an Airbnb or motel to “rest”, and repeat. It turns out, “rest” was not required! It was pretty wonderful sleeping by the water, watching sunsets and sunrises every day, and cooking simple meals all along the coasts of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. In January 2020, we took another trip down to the Florida Keys.

We Are Ready for VANLIFE!

Which brings us to our decision to buy the van. We determined that vanlife was for us, and so our next step was to decide on the van. We narrowed it down to the RAM Promaster and the Ford Transit. We drove both, we researched both, and decided on the Ford for the following reasons:
– we can choose an all-wheel drive for rougher roads
– higher clearance under the van, again for rougher roads
– easy to find parts and affordable for maintenance
– easier and more comfortable to drive

We are ready to order, but it seems Ford is not ready to take our order. The 2020 can not be ordered anymore, and the 2021 pricing guide is not yet on the Ford.ca website. Soon though! We’ll order, get the van in a few months, and travel as soon as we are able to again.

I have had time to plan 2 big trips. Our first will be to Western Canada, hopefully in 2021. Our second will be to California, hopefully in 2022. And there is a lot of talk about going back to Eastern Canada, back to Florida, and lots of places in between. So much to look forward to!

If you have any favourite places to visit and would like to share, we’d love to hear from you!  Thanks for visitng our site.

Yours Truly …. Yula

The last few trips we have taken have been with our Honda CRV camper conversion.  We converted the car we already had mainly to take a few trips and see if we enjoyed travelling this way.  It turns out we love it.  BUT… we do need a little more space.  We believe that the best solution for us is to buy a cargo van, and convert it just the way we like it.  We’ll take a look at a few different models, but on this day, we had fun Test Driving the Dodge Ram Promaster 2500.

Test Driving the Dodge Ram Promaster 2500

It was great fun to go home with our measurements and imagine how we’d build it.  I found the Ram Promaster Forum online with SO much information from others who have used this van for their campers.   I also found the layouts that others have used to put ideas on paper.  Click here for the link to those plans.  It looks something like this as a starting point:

We loved the van.  We will still likely test drive Ford Transit, and the Mercedes Sprinter, and make our decision after that.  We’re both looking forward to buying, building and travelling!

Yours Truly …. Yula