Adventure Magazine December 2019/January 2020

Others don’t think they could cope with the
lack of a convenient shower, or pooing into a
hole in the ground in the absence of a public
lavatory.
If you consider these issues to be
insurmountable, then yes, vanlife probably isn’t
for you, even though you could mitigate the loss
of comfort by buying a van of opulent luxury, one
with solar-panels that power a fridge, TV and
heater, with a gas kitchen and oven, and even a
compostable toilet.
These are increasingly the types of vans you
find these days. They are even becoming the
more dominant breed in dirtbag climbing circles,
where the cheapest vehicle possible used to be
the norm.
I’ve always been in the latter camp. There
was the Summerhouse, a 1987 Toyota Hiace
that wasn’t much more than a double bed
in the back of a van. Then there was Kiki, an
almost identical Toyota Hiace, followed by
Doris, another Hiace but with a game-changing
difference.
Doris had a top you could pop, enabling
this thing known as “standing” that had hitherto
been missing from my vanlife; hunching up to
cook at awkward angles as heavy rain poured
outside was not something that my fragile spine
ever got used to.
Doris, with her top popped, parked by the Takaka River in Golden Bay
"Social norms - from the importance of
looking your best or keeping up to date with
the latest TV fad - fade into irrelevance,
while weather reports become critical as
they dictate your next move."
Doris even had a sink with a retractable
shower-head that was operated via foot-pump;
you could shower as much as you liked, as long
as someone was inside pumping the water.
I must have yearned for the simpler lifestyle,
as my next van was a throwback: a 1980 Chevy
that looked nothing more than barely adequate.
Van Morrison made strange, random noises,
and broke down several miles out of Durango,
Colorado. It was pure luck that there was a gas
station nearby from where we could call the
American equivalent of the AA.
Free Candy was the best of all worlds: old
but hip, tall enough for standing in, yet cheap
enough to be kind to my savings.
It had a cooler (no fridge), a two-element
gas stove (no oven), a bookshelf and toolbox, a
coat rack, the Goal Zero powerbank (courtesy
of Ara), and abundant storage underneath a
memory-foamed double-bed.
It could provide refuge for five sleepers: two
in the bed, two on the floor on thermarests, and
one in a hammock tied to the roll-cage bars.
On days when the raindrops thundered into
the roof as if trying to reach the inside of your
belly, Free Candy provided a superb social
space: three chilling on the bed, three on the
back seat facing the bed and one on the floor,
lit by solar-powered lamps and some fairy
lights on each sidewall.
Free Candy was my ticket to dirtbag life
and I drove it endless miles from Canada to
Mexico and back, with visits to everywhere in
between.
It braved the rugged roads heading into
the remote mountains of the Wind River
Range, in Wyoming, and the infinite canyons
of Utah. It endured the deserts of Nevada for
Burning Man, and survived being trapped for
days in Tensleep Canyon while a fire raged. All I
could do was camp at the brewery in the small
nearby town and drink craft beer, awaiting Free
Candy’s fate; I was very relieved to recover it
unscathed.
It even persevered through the -30C
winters of Canada, a fate it was forced into
when I decided I wanted to try ice climbing.
Such conditions drove the mattress to stiffen
into concrete, making it slightly amusing to
wake up in a human-shaped cavity that my
body temperature had created in the otherwise
petrified base.
Vanlife shrinks the number of your
possessions as you realise the things you don’t
need. Social norms - from the importance of
looking your best or keeping up to date with
the latest TV fad - fade into irrelevance, while
weather reports become critical as they dictate
your next move.
You become a frequent user of public
services, from toilets to parks to the library,
as well as an expert in finding places to park
overnight. Parking on conservation land in the
US is generally permitted, but vanliving in the
climbing mecca of Yosemite Valley is strictly
against the rules and can attract an instant
fine of about $200.
For weeks I scampered up granite walls
in Yosemite and, at night, surreptitiously
“borrowed” a campsite in the Upper Pines
campsite. I thought I had been sneaky enough,
but to the trained and watchful eye, Free
Candy was always likely to belong to someone
unwilling to pay $40 a night for a campsite.
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