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