The First Trip

Our first big trip in the van was to Platte River Campground near Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. The portion of the campground we stayed in does not have power available at the sites, so it was a great test of the solar panels and battery bank in the van.

We spent 5 nights there, and it was a great test of the van and our setup. We borrowed a pop up canopy from my parents as we haven’t decided if we want a canopy that extends from the van or a stand alone one yet, and this let us try it out without a consequence. I think the answer is a stand alone canopy so we don’t have to take it down when we want to drive somewhere. Or at least that is the answer for now!

Cara’s parents were camping on a nearby site for the 5 days, and her cousin and cousin’s husband also joined us for a few nights. We were able to do some biking and hiking and lots of relaxing during the 5 days, and it was a fantastic vacation.

The van performed great, and while we were a little worried about how the solar panels and battery would do (especially since all our food was in our fridge and needed electricity to stay cold). The first night we only let the fridge run and used no other power, and the batteries were over 95% charge in the morning. The second night we ran one of the ceiling vent fans, and the third night we ran both vent fans and still had no issues. By the last night we ran both vent fans all night, made 2 pots of coffee in the morning and a full batch of waffles (Cara’s parents were headed to another campsite with power that day and had come with their trailer fully stocked, so we tested our system and took advantage of their gadgets) with no issues.

Each day the solar panels had us fully charged back up by the end of the day, and we’re now comfortable with what kind of things we can do without running the batteries all the way down. We don’t have a TV or any other big appliances in the van, so our power consumption is minimal most days. The other nice thing is that the van’s alternator charges the batteries, so even if we run them down overnight and use more in the morning for coffee/breakfast, if we drive somewhere to go biking, hiking, or anything else we may want to do the batteries get charged up and we don’t have to hope for a sunny day to top us off.

Making waffles using the power of the sun!


-Jeff

We Bought A Van!

2020 has been an interesting experience, and I think everyone can feel that one. We ordered our camper van in October of 2019 and finally took delivery in June of 2020. Delivery of the van ended up being only a few weeks after we moved into our new house, which was a bit of an interesting experience and the timing was not what we intended back in October.

I did a lot of research before we selected a company, and ended up going with VANDOIT, a upfit company out of Kansas City. They were super helpful during the design portion and kept us up to date as the build out happened. We were planning on having a boring white van, but as our turn in the build out process finally came around they happened to have a dark green van available and we jumped at the chance to not have the standard white one.

VANDOIT takes the passenger version of the Ford Transit (generally the 350 XLT version) and strips them, adds insulation and their wiring harnesses, and puts it all back together along with whatever of their options you select. We went fairly basic, and our van does not have a bathroom or kitchen, but we do have solar panels and a battery bank so we can have electricity off grid. That combined with our existing camping gear (stove, water jugs, etc.) set us up pretty well, and we’ll continue to make changes as we figure out what works and doesn’t work for us.

We camped a few nights on the way back to Michigan from Kansas City and we were extremely happy with the van, but knew we had to dial a few things in over time. We have lots of trips planned throughout 2020, so we’ll let you know how it goes!

-Jeff