The Story of the Van: Part Three

So “the Van” was finally in its new home with its new hippie wannabe owner. Driving it around was a hoot. People got excited when they saw it. When I had stopped on the way back from purchasing it to check and make sure my fuel tank wasn’t leaking, I had several people ask me when I was going to sell it as if they wanted to buy it. I can remember thinking “I won’t be getting rid of this anytime soon”…

One of the first items on the agenda was to purchase a “garage” from Sam’s club. These VW vans are notorious for rusting and I didn’t want my van sitting outside in the harsh Missouri winter.

I had learned on my trip back from St Louis that the heater didn’t really work so for most of that first winter the van sat in the plastic garage except for an occasional jaunt around town or to work. I also learned that for going out, nothing beat the van. On more than one occasion I would leave a bar or restaurant and find college girls getting their pictures taken in front of the van! Everyone loved the van…

I wasn’t real happy with the condition of the carpet which was the original green carpet. So my first project on the van was to replace the carpet. This turned out to be a little more labor intensive than I had expected as most of the furniture had to be removed to accomplish this. Eventually the carpet was replaced and I also had a CD player installed.

The van was ready for the triathlon season!!