Stitebunny
Adventurer
This is not a backcountry adventure or true expedition. But it is a trip report on a 2 week adventure and road trip with my family. I hope this is the proper forum and you enjoy looking at it! I have loved reading everyone else's trip reports so I thought maybe someone will enjoy ours and get you excited to get out there!
Back in February I found this van for sale online and after working out the terms, my wife (Claire Marie) and I (Chris) bought it sight unseen! The van was located in Wasilla, AK. My brother lives in Anchorage and was able to check it out for us before purchasing so it wasn't a total suprise what we were buying! The eventual plan would be for myself, my wife, and our 6 year old (Lucas) to fly up there and drive it back down the Alaska Highway!
We didn't have a plan as to when we could take the vacation time we needed to get the van home to the Seattle area so it sat at my brothers house until we were able to make the arrangements.
As the van sat currently it only had seats for 2. My brother was a big help and took on the job of installing the extra seat out of his VW Westy for our trip south! It worked out great for the trip!
It was somewhere around this time that my brother informed me that his 3 year old son, Hatcher, who had named their VW JoJo, had given our van the title, "Whitey"! And with us not having a name for it yet, it shall hereby be known as such! Until further notice. And I'll go with YT for now as that is probably more PC! He is only 3 after all! He just see's a big white van!
Fast forward 3 months to May 31! The day we leave! It was a long 3 months with the anticipation building! The wife and I both took 2 weeks of vacation and pulled the boy out of kindergarten for the trip!
Gear is packed and ready for the airplane! Man, that's a lot of stuff!
(pic to come)
Lucas is 6 and has never been on a plane before so this is the official start of his big adventure!
Stoked!!
The flight went great and Lucas actually slept for a few hours!
In Anchorage finally and our first in person sighting of our van!!
Another exciting part of the trip for us was to meet our new neice, Katla! About 3 months old!
Claire Marie holding Katla and (temporarily) wanting to have another baby!
After waking up and having some family time, I was excited to go check out the van and see what we bought! It was all pretty much how I expected from my brother and the previous owner describing it.
But one little thing, broken shock mount!
Had to cut off the u bolts and take the bracket to get welded and new u bolts made!
Once we waited until Monday and the shops were open, it was smooth sailing, along with some new cheapo front shocks!
To be continued:
Back in February I found this van for sale online and after working out the terms, my wife (Claire Marie) and I (Chris) bought it sight unseen! The van was located in Wasilla, AK. My brother lives in Anchorage and was able to check it out for us before purchasing so it wasn't a total suprise what we were buying! The eventual plan would be for myself, my wife, and our 6 year old (Lucas) to fly up there and drive it back down the Alaska Highway!
We didn't have a plan as to when we could take the vacation time we needed to get the van home to the Seattle area so it sat at my brothers house until we were able to make the arrangements.
As the van sat currently it only had seats for 2. My brother was a big help and took on the job of installing the extra seat out of his VW Westy for our trip south! It worked out great for the trip!
It was somewhere around this time that my brother informed me that his 3 year old son, Hatcher, who had named their VW JoJo, had given our van the title, "Whitey"! And with us not having a name for it yet, it shall hereby be known as such! Until further notice. And I'll go with YT for now as that is probably more PC! He is only 3 after all! He just see's a big white van!
Fast forward 3 months to May 31! The day we leave! It was a long 3 months with the anticipation building! The wife and I both took 2 weeks of vacation and pulled the boy out of kindergarten for the trip!
Gear is packed and ready for the airplane! Man, that's a lot of stuff!
(pic to come)
Lucas is 6 and has never been on a plane before so this is the official start of his big adventure!
Stoked!!
The flight went great and Lucas actually slept for a few hours!
In Anchorage finally and our first in person sighting of our van!!
Another exciting part of the trip for us was to meet our new neice, Katla! About 3 months old!
Claire Marie holding Katla and (temporarily) wanting to have another baby!
After waking up and having some family time, I was excited to go check out the van and see what we bought! It was all pretty much how I expected from my brother and the previous owner describing it.
But one little thing, broken shock mount!
Had to cut off the u bolts and take the bracket to get welded and new u bolts made!
Once we waited until Monday and the shops were open, it was smooth sailing, along with some new cheapo front shocks!
To be continued:
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