Van of Discovery

With all the traveling I've done, I've never really posted pictures of the Van of Discovery (Vof D). If it weren't for the Vof D, I would not have been able to see as much of the U.S. as I have, so it is only fitting that I pay tribute to the machine that has made my life-long dreams come true.

Before the Roadtrek, I had a 1982 Volkswagen Westfalia Vanagon, also known as a Westy. I LOVED that van, but after taking the infamous trip to Lubbuck, TX in 2005, we (me and Hope) decided that the Vanagon, loving named the Van of Disgust, just wasn't going to do it for us for any future long-range trips. I needed something that had air conditioning.
 

When deciding on what I was going to get next, I knew that I wanted to keep the acronym Vof D, so I decided that the next generation of conversion vans for me was going to be named The Van of Discovery (Vof D II, referred to from now on simply as Vof D).

I first started looking at the next generation of Westfalias, called the Eurovan. After looking for about six months, I realized that, although I would be vastly upgrading, the Eurovan still wouldn't solve the problem of keeping Hope cool while I played tourist. I needed something that had a generator and "house" air conditioning.

I don't even know how I decided on a Roadtrek. I remember seeing one near the CT/MA border and thought it was much too dark inside. Well, yeah, considering the fact that the Vanagon was all windows, anything else would be dark. After I purchased the new Vof D, I found out that there were many more Class-B conversion vans: Pleasure Way, Leisure Van, Sportsmobile, Coachman, and Great West, just to name a few. Luckily, it ended up being the Roadtrek that I liked the best.

The new Vof D is a 2000 Roadtrek 170 Popular. It is a converted 1999 Dodge B2500 Ram Van with the conversion being done by Home & Park, Roadtrek, in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada.

Below is a "tour" of the inside. The bed converts to a u-shaped dinette, but I don't have pictures of it set up. For the most part, I leave the bed made up:

The "house" section:

Looking forward at the cab:

The shower and toilet. Can't see the shower? It's in the middle of the isle, outside of the toilet closet.

A couple of improvements I made for better storage:

The other improvement I made was a screen room for the awning. Unfortunately, I cannot find the pictures anywhere.

So concludes the story and tour of the Van of Discovery