The Story of My Van ( Photos at Bottom )
About 5 years ago me and my girlfriend (now wife) bought a beautiful garage stored white 1986 ChevyVan G20. We bought her for hauling movie gear as we are indie film makers..aka starving artists. And also for camping and getting out of the city.
We lived in the mission district of San Francisco, so I'd always park her in a nicer neighborhood like twin peaks or diamond heights then walk 30-40 minutes home just to keep her clean. And I did, for about 6 months, then some hoodlum scribbled his tag across the whole driver side. After that it was over. Everytime I came back to her she was a different color with a different awful tag. Not a single good graffiti artist came by I guess. Or the dudes that tag work trucks are just punks without skill shooting at east targets. But at least now I could park her closer to home because "screw it" they're gonna get anywhere now.
After a year or so of that we got a sick deal on a paint job and chose sparkly green. (Vanna White's Green Dress) So now the local artist finally left us alone. And.. She looked [censored] sharp, people took notice. Then I started surfing and driving her everyday to the beach. And we camped in her anytime we got the chance. So, slowly but surely without even totally realizing it we were vannin.
A few years and 50,000 miles later (200K total) her engine goes and we come to a financial fork in the road. How much is our Van worth to us? The answer: She's [censored] priceless. We have the engine re-built and make the decision the finally do all the upgrades we always said we would. That was about 2 months ago.
So I got on Ebay and hit up the pick and pull. I've started to grind out the rust on the floor inside that had developed piles of surfboards stacked in her over time. Then cut some astroturf for carpet until I'm ready to put in the wood floor. Which should be next month. First I gotta find some old seats to go with the spinner bases I got at the pick and pull.
I got some clean original Center Caps, New taillights, sidelights, headlight bezels. New grille in the mail. Still got put in new headlights and turn signal just to freshen her look. Also found a pair of NOS Hex Bubble Windows. And a gullwang door kit from Matchstick (Not quite ready skill wise to put that stuff in but I know some dudes who are) I also put in a stereo and a backup cam and a bunch of other little stuff..
But one of the radest things I found in all this was the community of vanners rock'n and roll'n all over the country and beyond. Found this site, Rolling Heavy, Custom Vanner, Big Rons, ect ect ect.. looking forward to getting in deeper and deeper. that's my story.
Now without further ado, photos of Vanna White (In A Green Dress)
a few more photos for fun: