FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF VAN LIFE

I think this problem is much bigger than a coffee pot.

Do you want me to turn on.

The propane and boil some water?

Genius.

We're Karen Waith. After traveling internationally for the last four years and visiting 100 countries, 2020 brought us back to the United States of America where we purchased a converted sprinter van that will be our full time home as we travel across the US Exploring our home. A few weeks ago we picked up the van in Atlanta and drove it back to Nashville where we spent a few days making some updates.

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So we still have quite a bit of work that we want to do before we hit the road full time. But we thought it'd be a good idea to take the van on a little bit of a test run before we finish the renovations.

So the plan is to spend three nights camping in North Carolina with Nate's younger brother and his wife. That should give us an idea of what we need. And then we'll head back to Nashville to put the final touches on things. Plus we have a couple Amazon packages that didn't make it in time, so we have to go back to that too.

According to the lights on the dashboard, we have very little fuel left. And I've never filled this up before. I have no clue how big the tank is. So it's going to be really interesting to see how much this cost.

All right, diesel is 219. How much do you think this is going to cost?

$50.

$50? I'm going with more.

Really?

Yeah. I don't know how much it's going to be, but I assume our tank is at least 50 gallons for some reason. I'm going to guess 1:19.

No way. Is that finished.

I win.

I can't believe that this thing only holds 20 gallons. Now it says we can drive $600 for $45.

I also have no clue why it's beeping. It did this the very first day we got it. I'm gonna try and put it in drive.

Oh, drive.

How cute are these cookies? Sarah maiden forest has a van warming gift. She's the best.

Don't break.

Head southeast on Dixie street towards 7. Today officially starts our first ever camping trip in our van. And we are driving two hours through the smoky mountains to North Carolina.

We're an hour into the drive, and we're about to pass through pigeon forge, which is kind of like a resort town right before you get to the smoky mountains. And I'm having trouble figuring out how to describe this place.

The grave.

It's like a winner. Extreme racing. What the heck?

If I had to bet, I would say that it's home to the largest concentration of gift shops, arcades, and pancake houses.

It's like if you took every cheesy tourist attraction and just, like, packed them all in on top of each other.

We've had some good times there, but it is very cheesy.

Sarah, thank you for letting me borrow your helmet. My helmet's a little bit better.

Love the flower on this. Thank you.

Thank you. All right, we just got to cherokee, North Carolina, and we're going to do a little mountain biking. My goal today is just not to die.

Just in case. Yep.

Don't do anything I wouldn't do. Actually, I wouldn't do.

Don't get on the bike. So what are we doing first? The one with the exclamation marks on it. I would definitely like to go down. I would die if I go down that.

All right, I'm following you.

Love you. I'm gonna try not to worry. They said this loop takes about an hour, so Sarah and I will have to find a way to entertain ourselves in this parking lot.

All right. This could be dangerous because riding behind my little brother, I've got a lot of pride on the line. Right now.

I feel like this probably doesn't look hard at all. It's about 30 minutes of this. Just riding straight up the mountain.

To the top. It was far from easy. All right, we're gonna spin the wheel to see what we Do. This is a trail. That's a trail. That's a trail. And this is the hardest trail.

Okay. We're doing the hardest one.

That's not.

It.

They made it back.

I didn't crash hard.

You didn't crash hard.

I don't know if it's my adrenaline or my muscles, but, like, everything just kind of feels like this right now.

Oh, I'm so proud of you. There you go.

Are you proud of me?

Yeah.

I don't know if it's harder on your legs going up or down. Oh, it's tiring both ways.

Time for some well deserved leftover pizza.

Well, I can't. I don't know if you can see how wet I am right now. I just used our toilet for maybe like the third time ever and I accidentally turned the shower on myself. My whole back is stuck. I just panicked. I didn't know how to turn it off. I've never turned it on before. There's not a ton of space in here. I still don't know how it happened, but this boop all down my back. And now I have a wet ponytail and we have some soggy toilet paper. I have a feeling that that is not the last time that that is going to happen. Have fun.

If we were just sitting in the parking lot in a regular car, today would be a very boring day.

But.

But because we're in our van, it's kind of like having a friend over to my house for the day. Hanging out in a van is so much more fun. Especially because it's all so new still. Like, I've been dying for a reason to just sit in here and hang out. Especially now that all of our stuff is in here.

Let's go to the campground. I think I'm gonna be able to move my legs the rest of the week.

That was embarrassing.

You didn't quite center yourself with the camera.

No. Pretty wide turn radius there. It's nice, though. We're in the middle of nowhere.

Time to make some dinner.

The rain is coming. Oh, it's here. It's here. Thank you. This is like the ultimate test. Four people in here while we're cooking. I was a little nervous that both of us cooking in here at the same time would be a little too crowded. But we have a pretty good system. Nate's chopping over here. I'm assembling over here. Now we have to figure out where they go.

Case.

Dusty and Sarah have, like, a tent that goes on the back of their truck that they've never used before. So this is like the ultimate test.

Tonight we're having Mexican. I made guacamole and quesadillas. It's very warm in here.

Dinner was great. The rain stopped and we even have a tiny sunset.

First time using it.

The boiler's not working.

The inverter doesn't even look like it's on.

I think this problem is much bigger than a coffee pot.

Gently turn on the propane and boil some water.

Genius.

You're gonna make people watch water boil. Tips. That's no real.

Better be the best coffee I've ever had.

We're just gonna pretend like everything's fine.

Until we have coffee.

So as we were sitting in there having breakfast, I realized that this box that we plugged into might have an on off switch. And it does. So problem solved. But I feel very stupid right now. This is not my jacket. Just the most successful one by the door when I was going outside. Next step.

All right. There's finally been a break in the rain. And the whole reason we came to this campground is because it's really close to this river where you can tube down it. So the plan is to drive to the top of the river, get some tubes, and then float back to the campsite.

Feel like help?

I thought I could do it myself.

Trying to build up spy heat before we get in the freezing cold water. The sun is now behind the clouds again and it is not warm.

Oh, my goodness. What's your strategy? Right here.

Oh, yeah. I'm not wet at all. You give me a little kick.

You ready? Yeah.

My foot just went.

See you later. Later, Dusty.

Wow.

This looks fun.

This is so good. Yeah, Just spinning in circles. I'll kick you down. I'm so close to completely flipping. This is actually really fun. Oh, hurry, hurry, hurry.

Yeah, Success. There's so much water inside my tube right now. Why don't we let go?

How long do we think it's going to take to do two miles? We probably started at one.

Whoa.

That was cold. It was already cold and now it started raining. Just freezing. Spinning in circles going down the creek. We only have one day planned for this, so rain or shine, we had to make tubing happen. It would be a lot more enjoyable if it was warm, but this will probably be a lot more memorable.

Oh, this is gonna be the biggest one yet.

Keep your butt up.

I'm scared.

We did it.

1:59. Less than an hour. We made it two miles down the creek, but now we gotta get out.

How do we get out?

How do we stop.

Tubing was great. Today as a whole has been great, but the reality is I've spent about half of my day trying to figure out this power thing. The breaker out there wasn't on, and that was definitely part of the problem. But there is some deeper underlying issue that I can't figure out. This blue box right here. I'm not an electrician, from what I understand. Inverts the power that we're getting from outside into usable power for all of our outlets and fans and lights and everything. And also charges the batteries, which don't seem to be charging. So I'm taking things apart and putting them back together. It's essentially the equivalent of, like, turning something off and turning it back on.

Oh, my gosh.

Nate. What? Did you solve the power problem? No, it's better. You get to use your garlic press.

I'm about to use my garlic press for the first time.

Exciting times in the van, people. All right, now to take the next cord off. This one seems like it could potentially be more of an issue.

This space is too small. I can't get the.

The other issue is I have three tools. Pliers, flathead screwdriver, and a Phillips head. The other problem is I have no clue what I'm doing. Warning, high voltage. Do not open unless qualified to do so. All right, I feel like if these get out of the way, this is a lot bigger job than I thought it was. Well, I didn't get electrocuted, so that was a win. Now let's see if that actually fixed.

Is that the thing that you're not supposed to open unless you're qualified?

I didn't open it all the way. Just partially. I mean, I just can't imagine. There's a wire in there that goes together that's not supposed to be hooked up. So I'm gonna go plug this back in, turn this back on.

I don't think that fixed anything.

All right, I'm officially giving up for the night.

In part two of this episode, which is coming this Wednesday, we attempt to empty our pee tank for the first time.

Oh, I need your help. Okay, put the camera down. I need your help.

We explore the city of Asheville and climb a secret fire tower to catch an epic sunrise over the Blue Ridge Mountains.

It's pretty sketchy right here on the end.

I have to do it. This is a pride thing I was talking about. Oh, it's so skinny. I'll give him about a 5% chance to make it first try. Dang it. I don't want to do that.

Okay, I tried. I'm just grateful that I have the health to do it. As my grandfather always says, health is a crown on a well man's head that only the sick can see. That's a good popism. Can't put it much better than that.

It's almost guac clock.

Definitely don't do that.

I don't want to talk about it.

You know, this is why we're doing a test run. We're just out here learning things.

That's right.

We were starting over from the beginning. Don't hit your tailbone. Yeah, Watch out for the rocks on your butt.

I just broke my toenail off.