Hi, I'm Nabil and I'm Jenna and as promised,
this is the detailed video tour of our 1971 vintage camper remodel.
This video was 48 years in the making, kind of,
although we've only owned it for a year,
this camper has gone through several remodels throughout its lifetime as will
become apparent in this video tour,
which we're going to jump into right now, but first,
if you haven't seen the before video of our camper,
you may want to watch that to see what it was like before we did our remodel and
we'll give you a minute to do that. All right,
let's take a tour.
Welcome inside the new and improved Apollo, the camper
First
thing here we have is our closet.
We've got some new bins that we bought and the Nabil gets one.
I get one for our clothes and then this one we share for the bathroom stuff.
They are held in place with these little lips here so that we don't have to
worry about them when going down the road.
This is where the refrigerator used to be in the original camper to be on.
And I decided we didn't need as big of a refrigerator.
So now this is our pantry. We bought these cheap wire shelves.
I kind like them cause you can see through them.
And then we have another space here that we just didn't really know how to fill.
So what we decided to do is create a pullout
where we can have our shopping list on the back of this chalkboard paint.
So this is our new refrigerator. This is the Dometic refrigerator.
They make a bunch of different sizes. This I believe is their smallest size.
The way these fridges work is they can either be a fridge or a freezer.
They can't be both.
So we use it as a fridge and it can run off a DC or AC,
which we really like because we are completely off-grid.
So right now we're running off of a battery and it doesn't pull a lot of power
and it's completely silent. Coming back a little bit further,
we have our junk drawer as every tiny space has.
And down below we have where we keep our shoes.
We carry three or four pairs of shoes each.
This is probably the most original part of the whole camper.
We had the original three burner stove that works off a propane.
We have the original countertop and we have the original stink.
This a hand pump system that works out of our fresh water tank.
Over here is our sink faucet that we use when we're attached to the grid only.
Right now we're not attached to the grid so it doesn't work and we have magnetic
spice jars that hook right onto a magnetic strip.
It actually stays when we're going down the road. These don't fall off,
so it's pretty strong,
so we don't use this kitchen probably as much as you might think.
For the most part we like to cook outside.
I mean that's what camping is all about.
Now I'm taking you into the back half. This thing is huge, so
this area is six feet long and it's actually six feet wide as well,
so it's six by six. As you might remember in my first video,
the original table had this really clunky system.
It was really heavy and hard for me to maneuver,
so we decided to redo the table.
We just got cabinet grade plywood and we refinished it.
It swivels in two different directions.
So I can move this completely out of the way when I want it to be completely out
of the way, which is nice. It gives me a lot of space for activities.
The old table had a leg that went right down the middle.
So this we kept in case.
Later on we want to have a little bistro table with, we have the leg,
we can put it into this hole here and we can have a little round bistro table.
I'm sure the cushions that were in here weren't original,
but after using them we realized how much of a pain it was to constantly have
those three cushions that were in the middle in our truck because they couldn't
fit anywhere inside of the camper.
So what we did instead is have four long bench cushions made and what happens is
these backrest come in at night and create the center
Fake leather fabric,
so it's really easy to clean and the foam is really super dense so it doesn't
sink underneath you when you're sleeping on it.
We each have a little nightstand, which are these little patches.
They're actually just Velcro onto the felt that was already here in the camper.
I wouldn't necessarily put something too heavy in it,
but it's great for our like cell phones and maybe a small bottle of water.
So you might remember from the original video that we had planned on replacing
the system for the pop top and we're still working on that right now.
This is the original system and you'll see on the other side we have the new
system.
It's the same as it was in the original video pistons on one side and the
original bracket system on the side. If we have pistons on both sides,
we lose a lot of structural integrity for this.
See how it kind of moves back and forth already. Just by replacing one side,
we need to design some sort of bracing system so that it's braced in all
directions and it doesn't do this but it works for now. And uh,
as long as it's not too windy, if it works pretty good actually.
And the Nabil who is 6'5
can stand in the front half of the camper but not all the way in this half
of the camper. But obviously I have no problem.
We redid the curtains in here so these little tie backs are magnetic to each
other.
It's just little things like that that really make a space functional.
Over here we have the storage area for our blankets and pillows and then we have
our teeny tiny solar generator. It's called the Kodiak and it's from energy.
We just got it. But I really like it so far.
We've been using it for the last few days straight and we just have one set of
solar panels now. We took the solar panels off of the roof,
which was great cause it saved us a lot of weight.
And this thing has kept up with all of our needs. It powers our fridge.
It powers our cell phones. When we need to charge up,
we can turn on the inverter so that all of these outlets come alive and we can
power up our computers if we did need to charge it with something other than the
solar, like let's say we had a few cloudy days in a row,
we can plug it in really easily and it charges up super fast or we can plug it
into the car and charge it while we're driving down the road.
So we simply remove it. It's only 20 pounds.
Unplug everything and plug it into the car charger in the car.
So that's a pretty nifty thing.
The owner before us had already installed a fresh water tank and a gray water
tank. So this system was already in place.
We really haven't done anything over here at all. Underneath this bench,
I'm going to show you guys our toilet, our bathroom,
and here we have the men's
and the women's restroom and this is just a chemical toilet.
I think in the original video I said I was going to put a slider in.
I never did that. I just don't use this that often. But um,
basically it comes out,
I can use it if we're in a situation where there are no bathrooms nearby,
but I need to use the bathroom in the middle of the night. This is where,
this is what I would use. I don't use it that often.
So part of me wonders if I should use this space for something else,
but we already have plenty of storage in here.
So for now I'm just keeping the chemical toilet as is
All right, I'm going to show you the outside of the Apollo.
This was the original glass, same as this could not see through.
It had an awful butterfly on it that we needed to remove in the process of
finding. Remove said butterfly. Yours truly,
completely cracked and damaged the window. We've since replaced it.
We went with clear glass,
ended up working out great because you can now see all the way through Apollo
when you're driving. Fantastic.
The doorknob on this door very well might be from 1971 and it's very rattled and
our door has been flying open sometimes while we're driving,
so we have to, we're going to find a better solution.
We probably have to replace the knob and tighten things up,
but in the meantime we have to bungee this door shut before we drive.
Even when it's locked,
the lock rattles loose and this will fly open if we don't do that
One thing that we always get compliments on whenever we're out here is the
awnings on Apollo.
Jenna worked hard with an Etsy gal picking out the fabric and the colors
There's a track system that was a little bit tricky
to install because we did have to drill multiple holes into Apollo and every
time we drill a hole in this fiberglass shell,
we get really nervous because it could leak.
We had some leaks on the roof in our July trip last year and it's a pain.
We don't want that anymore.
So on this side of Apollo we have this nice decal of the good old USA and we're
using this to pinpoint all the places that we've been taking him and he stayed
overnight. Blue is home, that's Seattle.
Green is national parks and monuments that we've been to.
And yellow is everywhere else but overnight stay only if we're passing through
or visiting somebody and doesn't stay the night, it doesn't count
Here our Apollo's various hookups,
which the only one that is actually active that we use is this one here for
power to plug into shore power through various retrofits and his life.
I think this is an event at some point we don't even know.
And here's the other a hookup that we do use and this is the fill for the water.
We believe this is original. So pretty simple. Drop a hose in there,
fill it up with water for the sink.
And if we ever need to dump the freshwater tank, that's this valve right here.
And we empty said gray tank. This valve down here, this nozzle,
and here is the toe end of Apollo.
So this piece of plexiglass was already installed,
the previous owner to protect the window from rocks flying up and hitting it,
which is great. You don't want a broken window.
We've already had two on Apollo and not fun to replace. So we love,
we love this and you can take it off and replace it if it ever
breaks.
So the original solar system that was on had a some sort of switch and
we didn't need it anymore, but just a box proved to be very useful.
So this cable goes from our Kodiak unit inside to our solar panels that we
positioned outside.
And this waterproof box is providing an excellent housing for that.
Another nifty gadget that we have that we love is this trailer valet that comes
with this bracket and basically allows you to crank Apollo wherever you need to
spin in a 360 if we're parked at a campground where we would really like
the door to be on the other side from where the drop-off is,
we can spin them around with this bad boy in no time at all.
So since the kitchen in Apollo is so small and we love to be outside more than
inside, typically a couple items that we tend to always bring with us.
Just a regular old grill.
This comes with us on every trip to cook outside and this base camp minus the heater
system that works on propane that provides instant hot water for dishes and also
for outdoor shower.
Thanks for watching.
Make sure to like share and subscribe and if you'd like to hear in more detail
about anything in our vintage camper,
ask your questions in the comments and I will make another video to answer all
of your frequently asked questions. Until next time. See you guys later.