Thanks for joining me!

Don’t let your dreams be dreams — Jack Johnson

OK… here we go! After so many people asking me if we are going to keep a blog of our trip, I’ve decided to give it a crack, if not for other people to read but for a record of what we get up to for ourselves to look back on. So please bare with me, I don’t consider myself much of a writer so I hope it’s not too rambling! If you prefer pics over words check out my Instagram instead: nesrs_lens

Starting from the beginning, me and Tim met in September 2013 and quickly fell in love (awwww). By the time Easter 2014 rocked around, we had decided to go on holiday together – in a hired campervan up to the Gold Coast (approx. 2,000km round trip) with lots of stops along the way. When we talked about this upcoming trip with Tim’s family, I was warned that almost every relationship Tim had been in had ended soon after a disastrous holiday together. I love a challenge! We actually ended up having the best holiday either of us had ever had – including many trips overseas to all kinds of locations. We loved living in the camper, free camping and staying in campsites and national parks. We took our pushbikes and rode around the little towns and villages we visited and spent many hours on the east coast beaches, loving the clear water and warm summerish autumn sun.

Parked up at one of our favourite free camping spots in SWR.

It was around 6 months later that we decided to upgrade our 4 man tent and Suzuki Vitara soft top and get a van. Thrifty Tim found us a cute little Toyota Townace for a cool $4k and we used this for many long weekends away up and down the NSW coastline. We had our favourite spots – some of them we discovered on that first trip of Easter 2014 (Seal Rocks, South West Rocks, Port Macquarie…)

The trusty townace. She had done around 500,000 kms by the time we sold her and the old girl still had a lot of life left! Toyota’s never die. She was my first car!

It was around mid last year (2018) that we finally decided to do our dream holiday around Australia – with sometime in 2019 vaguely pencilled in. We would randomly browse the catalogue of vans on Gumtree and debate the practicalities of a van or mini bus (Toyota Coasters) or a caravan or a 4WD vs. 2WD… One rainy Sunday we finally decided to go look at one van that stood out to us – for Tim, it was cheap. For me, it had a great kitchen and I could see the potential. We got all the way out of our comfort zone (the Northern Beaches) to the Hill’s district somewhere and found our Transit. We went to pick her up a week later for $15k after some negotiations.

Vans vans first big trip – 3 weeks over Xmas ’18 up to Noosa. We didn’t want to come back to Sydney.

She had a few issues, being an old girl with a few km’s on her dial. The previous owners had just returned from a trip around Australia (theirs only taking a quick 3-months!). She needed new brakes and a few days after having her parked out the front of our place at the beach her horn got stuck on (how embarrassing!). So after a good once over by the mechanics and auto-electrician she was doing better.

The old awning off, the new roofracks on! Solar panel to come off and go on the roofracks along with the boards, new awning and toolbox.

Next came the fun part – making her ours. Despite ol’ Van’s van having a great kitchen, her walls were a bit worn, the bed a bit small and the storage a bit haphazard. So of course my priority was making her look good – Tim’s job was to make her functional and be able to fit all our stuff in AND on her. I randomly started getting facebook and instragram ads for a place called 4WD Supacentre – and after many visits to their website we decided to call in to the shop at Heatherbraes after a trip up the coast. We bought our roofracks and a new awning and an awesome 4WD drawer for under the bed that fits all my clothes (in fact nowhere near “all” but enough to see me through a year in a van!). Tim attached the new roofracks and sorted out the numerous boards he’s insisting on taking away with us (2 surfboards – one long, one short, and our 2 SUP’s) and bolted on a big silver toolbox, which meant we could move all the tools and must-have but hardly-used things up on to the roof. We had to get a ladder so Tim could get up there and found a great extendable one on eBay (pretty sure 4WD Supacentre also sells them though). It folds down pretty small and fits under the bed. We also got a second hand scooter rack so we can bring our scooter on the road with us, super handy for places like Byron and Noosa where parking is a nightmare.

My ideas to make her look good came from other peoples instagrams (#vanlife) and a random post I saw on facebook from one of the Kmart lovers pages I follow, about a woman upcycling her kitchen bench using rolls of vinyl for $3 each from Kmart. Genius! I was beginning to hate our walls and found they had some cool designs. I went for a white beachy/vintage shiplap style and got I think 6 rolls. So for less than $20 I was able to transform the whole look of the interior of the van. It was a bit annoying to do around some of the fittings we couldn’t unscrew from the walls, but it was way less annoying than it would have been to pull the walls out completely and re-do them (that would mean pulling out the kitchen – nightmare.)

Freshly vinyled walls! $20 thanks Kmart (don’t look too closely at those bubbles, I sorted them out later). You can see the strip of old brown at the bottom, the new walls make it feel so much lighter and brighter – and bigger!

The rest of the decor followed easily after the walls went up. Our bedding from the old van already looked good in there and didn’t clash too bad with the tropical palm print curtains (courtesy of the old owners). I found some more cool vinyl for the kitchen splashback that looks like Moroccan tiles from Bunnings, we got some new overhead storage baskets (Kmart again!), and I put in all my pot plants. I’ve never had a green thumb so I’m not sure how long they’ll survive with me as their sole caregiver. They look cool though and are good oxygen air clearing plants or something (my workmates will tell you so).

The hanging plant courtesy of a cut off from the office and the baby palm I’m overwatering and giving a slow death to. I made the macrame pot holder myself!

I’ve had to be restrained in purchasing all the pretty and practical things I’ve seen in the Freshy boutiques – I did cave and bought a cool brass hook in a palm shape, but there’s also this cool pineapple:

I could hear Tim in my head when I was in the shop “we don’t need it” and “that’s a very expensive hook”

I might go back this weekend.

Speaking of: this weekend is our last in Freshwater. Wah! I’ve loved living here, I love the beach, the village and the people of freshwater. I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. I’ll be back!

Here’s what I’m going to miss the most:

The view from our apartment. Many good times over the past 3 years at the beach and swinging in our hammocks in the park.

Tomorrow is also my last day at work. I’m so excited about our trip and taking a year off, but also sad to say bye to the amazing people I have spent the past 18 years with at my awesome company. I’ll be back in a year though and I know it’ll fly by – just like the past 18 years have!

3 days to go until we move into the van full time and leave Sydney! We still have a few things to clear out of our apartment – pretty much selling or donating everything except a ton of my clothes and a big box of sentimental possessions which my bestie Suzi is going to look after for us.

Our first official stop is Bluesfest in Byron, with a couple of nights somewhere on the way up there. Suzi has organised an amazing big house for us for 10 days though, so vanlife will begin on ANZAC day. Oddly enough we moved into our apartment here in Freshy on ANZAC day 3 years ago!

Well hopefully that wasn’t too rambling (I know it was). Wish us luck – and I’ll try my best to update this relatively regularly so that the posts aren’t as long as this one ended up being!

X Van + Tim + Van X