Van Build Blog

Our one-of-a-kind pink and green campervan that has quite a story behind it. It is our home, our storage and our transportation as we travel to every country in the world.

But getting to have such a unique van was a journey that almost broke us mentally, physically and financially.

Let’s back up to Day 1….

We started our journey in Norway, where we purchased a Volkswagen T4 campervan and named her Good Time Sally. She had her own backstory and was previously owned by a BASE jumper who had died wingsuit BASE jumping. His name was Dave, below is a photo of him and his wife before we bought her.

This was the smallest space we’d every lived in, but we took her to some magical places all over Europe.

When we arrived in Greece, we realized it was time for a new van. We were having some registration issues with Good Time Sally and were ready to commit further into creating a home for ourselves that we could live in long term as we set the world record to skydive and paraglide in every country of the world.

Through Pepi, a Greek local we met rock climbing, we found Giannis (aka Johnny). A crazy Greek man with a T4 syncro (4×4) for sale.

He had a crazy idea for the van – to create pop out sides that increase the living space. This had never been done before – a side pop out on a VW T4.

We knew it was risky – to create a never before van design and trust that this person whom we’d never met before wouldn’t permanently destroy our future home and leave us homeless.

He said it would only take 40 days. And so we began the van build.

The 40 day van build escalated into an 8 month van build as the design become intricate with unique bells and whistles.

Before we knew it, the design had not one but TWO pop outs, had become taller by putting the old van roof on the new van, a tall custom built door, external and internal roll cage, dog bed, dropdown tables, paramotor/spare wheel back storage that opens up, pull up bars, upper rack/deck, custom fenders and so many more bells and whistles.

We lived in a mechanic yard and garage for 8 months. The days were long and grueling, filled with grinding and welding metal all day long.

It felt like we would never leave, and our souls and bank accounts were slowly draining.

But we stayed with it, knowing that somewhere at the end of this tunnel was the light – a dream to have the most amazing campervan for our journey.

And then it happened. We painted the van and began ‘finishing’ the van build. It looked better than we could have ever imagined. Like a dream coming together before our eyes.

Finally, it was time to say goodbye to Yanni and continue our journey to skydive and paraglide in every country of the world.

We spend a few more weeks in Greece before crossing into Turkey, heading east into Asia, off the beaten path. And that is where we find ourselves now. Wayyyyyy off the beaten path in our beloved campervan, appropriately named, ‘All The Money’.

I wish I could say that we lived happily ever after, but we still find struggling almost daily with the van and it seems like around every corner, we find ourselves in another precarious van-related situation.

But we suppose that’s what makes it a true adventure. Not knowing what will happen next.