hey i'm emily and i'm danny and welcome to our van tour
we've been traveling in this van for three years all the way from the northernmost point in alaska
down here to panama with our cat graham and our dog sombrita we bought the van used and converted
it ourselves it's a dodge ram promaster 2500 159 inch wheelbase high roof edition come on in
first things first we have the world map as our countertop here we mod podged it to the wood with
a piece of plexiglass on top this is our fruit hammock triangular so that whenever we're driving
it does not hit the walls and the fruit doesn't get bruised we have our souvenir magnets that we
found around the world and we also have magnetized spice jars that fit onto this metal plate that we
got from great sand dunes national park so here is our stove it's inset so that whenever we're not
cooking we can use it as a countertop okay we're heading over to the water system this is a crucial
part of the van it really determines how long we can stay out here isolated wild camping before
going back into town and getting more water so we have just a bar beverage sink as our sink and then
our faucet is normal we do use it on low flow a lot so that we can serve water so we don't have
to leave we also have it on a switch to conserve energy underneath we have a 14 gallon metal fusti
tank the double doors are really nice for the breeze but they're also perfect for refilling
our tank it doesn't have any plastic flavor which is our favorite part about it next to the fusti
tank we have our sink water collector we drain it every couple of days it's just a five gallon
jerry can over to the cooking system under here we have our one gallon propane tank it lasts about
two months and it costs three dollars every time to refill we always shut off the propane at the
knob up here and clear the lines whenever we're finished cooking next to the propane tank we have
all of our cooking equipment our pots pans and stuff to make hot beverages underneath we have our
pet food our towels that we use as paper towels very important to us to minimize waste and our
carbon footprint so we only use cloth towels for cleaning behind our towels we have some extra food
storage that we don't use every day but is nice to have carrying around in the van each of us also
has a shower bag contains our soap and towel we have our drawers this is the utensil drawer which
holds all of our utensils so for cooking we also have our reusable napkins in here to reduce our
waste and then next we have our table our pull out table that we eat and work on together below that
is our miscellaneous drawer this just holds items that we use every day that we need pretty quickly
and then below that is another cabinet where we hold our backpack that we bring into cafes
and hostels to work on our laptops some books and then below that is some more storage
okay so heading over to our overhead cabinets these are all secured to a beam in the ceiling
on the outside we have a sand painting from a market in new mexico we have this ram that we
got in a live art market in utah and then we also have this hair thing right here that is just used
to secure the cabinets while we're driving so inside of this cabinet we have our bowls
plates cups and the containers we use for leftover food we also have a couple games in there
in this cabinet we have all of our dry food this is stuff that we eat every day so it's really
easy to get to right above the stove and in this cabinet this is basically our bathroom cabinet
we have our sunscreen our first aid kit toothbrushes toothpaste and we even have a mirror
we'll head over to our wardrobe which is also graham's apartment we've got danny's clothes
my clothes danny's clothes my clothes and above the wardrobe we have two compression packs that
we put our coats and sweaters in so around the back of the wardrobe graham also has an entrance
from the bed and this makes it so that the dog can't get to it and he has his own little area
welcome to our bedroom so this is a queen size six inch memory foam mattress and on top it's
a bamboo pillow topper super comfy the width of the promaster is about six feet so we are able to
sleep sideways but we did have to cut our mattress a little bit it's okay though because we're pretty
short so our toes never touch or neither does our head so over here we have our little alien guy who
holds our nighttime little stuff my aunt made this for us for christmas one year which is super nice
over here we have our carbon monoxide detector which also says the temperature sometimes it's
not that cool down here we have our dimmer switch for the two lights above the bed and we can turn
this on and off with our toes before we're gonna go to bed up here we have our ukulele mounted to
the ceiling this is my favorite part of the bed area it's a little secret picture frame shelf that
we put together with just some hinges a carabiner and some string and for movie nights we can put
the laptop on here and we can relax in bed together it's super nice so central america
is pretty warm so before we came down here we installed some extra fans in the columns
we have four computer fans and we have a switch that connects to them right next to your head
so you can turn that on and off whenever you get a little warm and right above our heads we also have
an intake fan which we can turn on and off right here so basically while you're laying in bed you
can turn on and off five different fans which is perfect for central america it is very hot
here we're moving on to the bench seat in front of the bench we have our plaque from our wedding
on this wall we have the map of central america where we've been tracking our progress southward
under this bench we have our fridge which is a dometic top loader fridge which saves energy
and keeps it colder inside we can hold about a week's worth of food inside and plenty of beers
over here we have graham's box inside is his litter box an air freshener and his scooper
mounted onto a wall on the outside we have a scratch pad and also his face groomer and
in this box we have our electrical system which i'm gonna throw it over to danny to explain
so in here we got the solar charge controller which connects through the wall up to the
solar panels and here into the back to the batteries the batteries are in the trunk
as well as the inverter because that's very large but here we have a remote switch
to turn on the inverter so we don't have to dig through the trunk
we also have a bluetooth device so that we can check the state of the batteries with our phones
down in here we got the main fuse box so from here everything runs over to our appliances
as well as the smart battery isolator which allows the alternator to charge our house
batteries when we're running the vehicle some breakers for safety this is the ground bar to
connect to ground the chassis and a thing to shut off the solar panels if you ever need to
outside of there we have also the outlets we have ac dc and usb outlets
as well as our switch to turn on our lights probably the best thing about our layout is
that under the bed you have tons of storage so i'm going to show you guys what we call the garage
now under the bed we also store a table, a crash pad for climbing, and a couple other things
but down here the first thing you'll notice is the mexican flag which is somewhat a reminder of
home for sombrita and also privacy for our stuff when we want to leave the doors open
and get that breeze when i organize the trunk i always like to order by the most used items are
easiest to get out so i'm going to grab out a few of those easy to grab items right now
my guitar my bmx and the chairs we carry five gallons of extra water here which comes in handy
over here we keep our backpacking gear which we've used numerous times
always a good adventure so we love having that stuff but it is pretty bulky and then up here we
have some tools and a spare camping stove so i'll grab that stuff out so you can see the next layer
so in this side of the trunk we have some recovery gear we have chains we have a tow strap
we have over here maxx tracks and a shovel an extra table but back in here is some important
parts of the electrical system this box here is the battery box so you can open that up and look
at the batteries inside but from there the cables go forward into that electrical control center and
above here you'll see the inverter the inverter converts the dc power from the batteries to ac
power that you usually use in your home so we can use laptop chargers and other things that will
only run off ac power but that does incur a 20 to 30 percent loss of energy so we do have a lot of
cigarette port plug-in chargers to avoid that penalty on this side of the truck we have emily's
bike another tool chest over here pet food over there but what's really cool is that here we
can put longer items we cut a hole in the front there so the longer items stick through underneath
the wardrobe where there's some dead space there so we can fit my skis emily's snowboard
the sunbrella for the beach as well as my fishing spear so that is really nice of course we made use
of the vertical space by hanging some more items and there's plenty of other random things in here
let's go check out the solar panels
welcome to the roof up here you can see our 200 watts of solar
which goes down into our 310 amp hours of battery as well as the alternator charging that system
while we're driving the vehicle that electrical system for us has been great to run the fans all
night or run the heater during the winter but the sealed lead acid batteries are starting to
age a bit after three years so their capacity is a little less we have here our roof ventilation fans
this is a maxx air fan and it's been so great throughout the trip that we
decided to mount another one underneath the solar panels here so we get that inward and
outward airflow down here on the pan american highway it's been very useful besides that
i store my surfboard up here with just these uh quick cinch straps that you can undo quickly
when you want to get the surfboard down and then pick it back up here and tighten it super quick
so that's the roof through danny's bmx friends we found an artist nick sawyers to paint the van for
us at first we wanted to remain stealthy while we parked on side roads and parking lots but
after being in the van for a year and a half we decided we were gonna head to mexico and further
south and we knew as soon as we entered these other countries our license plate was going to
be an oddity anyway so we thought let's just paint the entire side of the van we're super glad we did
and it's definitely the most unique part of our van welcome to the front room of our house which
is basically a car but it does have some useful things i'll show you now up here we use this loft
for a little additional storage for our bags our hammocks our cat one of his many hiding spots he
loves sitting up here and then down here on the back of the seat we keep our reusable produce bags
these are great for avoiding using plastic in the grocery store you can put your veggies and
your fruits right in there down here we actually installed a heater hard to imagine down here in
panama but when we were sleeping in ski resort parking lots and it would snow 10 inches on
us and we'd wake up hit the slopes this thing was critical to maintain our comfort in the van
it's really nice having a gasoline-powered heater because it just works off your gas tank
you don't have to fill anything else and it's super safe externally venting all the gases
something else that really makes it feel nice in here is these swivel seats it really feels
homey in here when you swivel these things some other changes we made up here we installed an
aftermarket radio with my dad's help this is the S.S. USB which stores our music I got this up in
Alaska on a boat tour for spotting the first whale and then over here we installed an aftermarket
cruise control and down here is the thermostat for the heater these vans have great huge windows
up front for watching the world but when you're parked and it's hot out the window covers really
come in handy for privacy and insulation we really wanted to do the conversion ourselves
because the cost is way cheaper it's about a fifth the price of buying one of these built out
as well as you get it exactly how you want so we were able to add in a bunch of cool little things
like the hammocks so we have two hammocks one is a full length hammock Danny uses that hammock to
sleep when it's super hot out and then it's also the guest bed we also can use that hammock outside
and then we have another hammock that is used to look out the side door whenever we're at a nice
vista it's also a pretty sweet chair for extra people to sit another cool thing we added is a
projector mount that makes it so the back wall of the van becomes the entire movie screen it's also
really sweet outside you put a couple magnets in a sheet on the side of the van and you can have
a campfire watching a movie we made practically everything in here the cushions the window covers
and even the curtains we designed our build first using a 3d modeling program and back then i had
one of those vr headsets so we were even able to check it out in virtual reality and see how
it felt we really wanted the build to be simple and comfortable because of that we were done in
three months and it only cost about three thousand dollars to do the build plus there's tons of space
in here at one point we even took 12 of my family members for a ride in the end the build was the
most fulfilling satisfying project we've ever done when designing a van there are so many trade-offs
we tried to err on the side of simplicity while we were doing this first hands-on project together
one trade-off we made was not putting a shower or a bathroom in the van but i really don't mind yeah
usually it's pretty easy to find a shower we do have a camp shower we can use in the wilderness
and besides that when you have a shower you need to carry a lot more water and sometimes people
put the plumbing under the van all our plumbing is inside the van so when we winterize the van
all i had to do was add a little bit of 12-volt heat tape under the sink we were done bathrooms
are even easier to find than showers but in nature in the middle of nowhere you can always dig a hole
but back out your TP! another thing that we don't have in the van is an oven but we do have
a stovetop version that we use to bake in here sometimes and we also have perfected cooking on
a campfire yeah unfortunately we don't have a 4WD van but we've gone on tons of crazy roads
to epic places it's just that it was really impossible to find a used four-wheel drive van
and the cost would have been double to buy a new van one thing that we would have done differently
after all this time of living in the van was getting lithium batteries in the beginning
they were just really pricey and we didn't know how much we would like living in here
so we thought we'll do an upgrade later and yeah maybe we'll do that upgrade sometime soon
but even considering the trade-offs we've made we have loved living in this van it has offered us
cheap limitless long-term travel as well as amazing comforts on the road we never have to
sleep in any random sketchy beds and we get to bring our two pets with us along the way
we have the independence to cook anywhere do our dishes and run all these electronics
without relying on anyone else and we have the freedom to do it at the top of a mountain
or at an isolated beach basically any place accessible by some semi-sketchy roads we love how
the van gets us in nature and that we can use it for base camp for our favorite outdoor activities
we hope you enjoyed the tour if you have any questions let us know in the comments
and please subscribe so that you can follow on our journey we've already been from alaska to
panama and we're heading this promaster down to argentina thanks see you guys next time