I think that was great.
Well, I think the main message I'm trying to get across is that you're way more
capable than you think you are. The human spirit seems to be full of unlimited
potential. At least in my own experience with myself as I continue living I find
that the more I do the more I realize that I'm capable of way more than I ever
thought I was. You have potential and I know it's scary to live up to it but you
can do it. You'll always surprise yourself and the
world is a big mysterious place and it's better to experience it firsthand than
to experience it through what other people are telling you. Big love! Dylan Magaster, over and out!
First off, before we go any further. Dylan
why are you wearing one glove? Because I decided it was a good idea to puncture
my hand. Actually I didn't decide it. I wasn't even thinking and that's the
problem. Long story really short I found a dead
Sea Turtle and I cleaned the skull and I was like, "I want to mount that on my van"
because it looks badass. I pre-drilled the skull so that I wouldn't crack the
skull, but I didn't pre-drill the hole into the van so I was trying to screw it
straight in so it was slipping so I was like, "well, let me just pre-drill it." That red
case that dropped. And then, this happened.
Oh f*&%, I just punctured my hand.
That like definitely just went into that muscle. Let's grab the First Aid kit.
We've dressed the wound and now
we can continue on as the Blue Handed Bandit.
Rael, try to keep me from doing things that are mindlessly dumb.
So that explains the glove. Hand's all better now. I've healed from that. Back to
the main event, Gladys 2.0. If you're an absolute savage you may remember what my
van looked like when I first bought it. And if not!
I bought a van. That's the van that I bought.
Let me show you the features. Two captain chairs .
Neither which swivel. A stereo that does not work. 65,000 miles. Fully functional
wheelchair lift with two tie downs that I don't need so that's gonna be sold. TV and
a VCR of unknown functionability. A high-top roof for optimal standing
conditions. And a helluva personality. I bought Gladys on June 6th of 2016. In
August of 2016 I built out Gladys and created Gladys 1.0 baybay.
I've been making casual upgrades as I've been going like a light bar and Abel
Zyl made me a little bookshelf in there, which is dope, but recently I embarked on
a five-week adventure through Baja California, Mexico, Baja Sur, all the way
down to Cabo with Rael and I had to make some decent upgrades to Gladys to
make sure that she was up for the challenge. Those being...I immediately
bought a dirt bike because I mean isn't that what you would do? So then I had to
figure out how to carry the dirt bike and so then I had to mount a, what are
those called? Hitch. I had to put a hitch on Gladys. I went under the van and I
started to install the hitch because it seemed pretty straightforward, but as is
it everything, I ran into hurdles. This piece is the piece I'm trying to remove. I got
the two bolts out from right there. That's what these bolts are, but this one I can't
get out. It keeps spinning. It's just spinning in
place. So I had to take the van to a shop here in Yucca Valley and they punched
out those bolts. I went to install the hitch and I was having some issues again
because single person under there and it was also like not fitting. I took it back
to him and they got it installed, the hitch, for me. I had to move the spare
tire because of the dirt bike so I had to put that on top of my van
and then I put the trasharoo up there and that was all cool and fine and
was hanging out all snazzy like. Every once in awhile it was falling in front of my
rear backup camera, so that was a problem, and then also people kept like yelling
at me while I was driving like, "Hey, do you know that bag is like hanging
off your van?", and I was like, "yeah"...and so then I decided to just drill it and
mount it straight into the door so that's straight-up drilled into my door. I
bought a motorcycle rack so that I could carry the dirt bike down to Mexico. I
stopped by the swap meet here in Joshua Tree actually in Yucca Valley. If you're
ever in the area you gotta visit swap meet. That's where I got that black box and
that's also where I got that first aid box, which is a beauty.
So that black box kind of acts as my outdoor garage now mounted on the back.
A lot of people are afraid of like drilling into their vehicle and cutting
holes in their vehicle and I've never really understood that because my
thought is as long as you seal it properly, you just mount stuff
to your vehicle and maybe I mean let me know if you disagree with that but
that's what I think. What else did I do? Oh so, Gladys had a few cancer spots that
I tried to take care of. I'm not a doctor nor a mechanic nor a physician, but I did
clean the wound and tried to get rid of any rust and dead areas.
Scrubbed it up all real good then I sealed it with tire, nope, sealed it with truck bed liner.
I ended up doing that all the way around the bottom of Gladys. There's one main spot
down here near the passenger side fender that was pretty significant that I ended
up using gaff tape, screen from a window screen, and then more gaff tape
and then truck bed liner because it works.
I also added this which you can't see, exterior light, which has been quite
useful. Highly recommend exterior lighting. I mounted some max tracks to
the side of the van because well I mean you are going to get stuck eventually
and so I did get stuck and they came in handy, but not as handy as I wish they
would have because they didn't get me out. I made a bed extension so that I'd
no longer have to sleep diagonally. Also since that last video I had lumpy
cushions I fixed that a long time ago added just three inch foam so
they're not like extremely comfortable, but they're I mean they're not bad. It's
kind of like living in a van. And finally, I recruited Rael to help me install the
awning and that was kind of a pain in the ass.
Put it up but the roof of my van is like concave. Five out of six bolts are
mounted. The other one is just filled with silicone so it doesn't leak, but
it's totally on there. I mean it's been on there for like two or three months
and I haven't had any issues with it. Other things that I have added in
addition are a Dometic refrigerator. That thing, okay, that thing is great. It's huge
so I can hold like a gallon of whatever type of drink you want and a week's
worth of food. One of the great things about that fridge is that it's got a
monitor on it so if your battery bank is low it won't cycle, which is super nice
because like then it's not just gonna destroy your battery bank. There's been a
lot of other small improvements like mounting the yoga mat onto the wall with
gear ties. I also added this little vision from Miguel and Gladys in La Paz. Stayed at an
Airbnb in La Paz and they gave me that as a gift and it was like, "whoo!" Added a
shelf into the window which was helpful. Basically made a whole bunch of small
upgrades. This is Gladys 2.0. Here are the specs.
She's got 200 watts of solar going into a 200 amp hour battery bank, which powers
a DC compressor fridge as well as a thousand watt inverter as well as two
lights and a fan. That also charges camera gear during the day and by night
just runs the fan. She's got over a hundred thousand miles. Gladys has one
hundred and two thousand three hundred miles. She gets about 15 miles to the gallon
give or take depending on the roads and the fuel quality and how I'm driving.
Gallon of propane, 12 gallons of fresh water, three gallons in a solar shower
which is totally arguable if it works or not. Common question I get is, "Dylan, how
did you make that dope ass floor?" Well this is how I
made it. Basically, first you got to get a giant map. So I cut a piece of plywood
about yay big. I glued the map to the plywood with
spray glue and then I was gonna cover it with polyurethane like 80 times until it
developed this like thick resin, but the plywood was warping and whenever I
straightened it out it created bubbles I was like, "No!", but I'm aren't committed to this
idea so how am I gonna do it? So I found polycarbonate on Craigslist like
plexiglass but I used Lexan and so I got a piece of Lexan, cut it to size
screwed it down, and that's how you create that floor. Update. So Thursday March
15th I will be live-streaming at 3 p.m. Pacific time. Come join the channel
for that and you can ask me whatever you want during that time and I will answer
it because you'll have my full undivided attention for approximately an hour.
Today I also launched an online store so you can go buy merch now for FLORB
Floating Orb Productions, which is the company that I'm starting and last of
all thank you to the Patrons that support the channel that think that my
content is good enough to actually support it and so, if you're interested
in becoming a Patron go check out the Patreon page. There's all sorts of different
perks that you can get. I really appreciate you guys that have like
committed to support the channel. So, to recap, live stream March 15th 3 p.m.
Pacific time. Go buy some merch and if you want to
join the team, join on Patreon. So stay tuned because
this is gonna be dope year! Believe me, it will be. Have a great day.