OCTOBER 2020
You might know that I have a love for a retro & vintage esthetic, so hiring a seventies VW van was something that I dreamed about for a long time. When COVID came looking around the corner, Hielke and I decided to rent a VW van so that we would have a fun experience planned in the summer time, while still being able to practice social distancing. I usually prefer style over comfort anyway, so I expected this experience to go down very smoothly, but unfortunately this was not the case. Perhaps I was a bit naive with renting a van while pregnant.. If you are curious to rent a vintage van, you must read this blogpost as it will help you avoid some of the mistakes that we made.
How to rent a vintage VW van
A quick google search will learn you that there are a few possibilities to rent a VW van. We ended up renting our van through the Dutch platform Goboony. Goboony is like an airbnb for camper vans; owners of campers and camper vans can use this platform to rent their van for a few days or a longer period. Goboony takes care of the insurances, so you don’t have to worry about that. You will find lots of individual owners on Goboony, but we rented from a company who had several renovated VW vans. Our experience with Goboony was very good, the instructions, payment and communication was easy and the cancellation policies were very lenient because of COVID. We paid about € 1.000 for seven nights of renting the van. Of course you can find a cheaper camper, or a more luxury one, but we had our heart set on the vintage VW van and those are pretty popular and expensive to rent.
Where did we go with the campervan?
This was the first mistake of our holiday, as I had planned to travel way too far. Originally, at the time when we rented the van, we had planned to visit some nature parks in the Netherlands and meet up with some friends. Borders were still closed at that time and this seemed like the max we could do during summer. Of course, when the borders opened again in June 2020 I immediately started dreaming of traveling again and I made the ambitious plan to take the VW van to Austria instead. I knew that you would travel slower with a retro van, than with a car, but I had no idea how much slower we would actually be. From Eindhoven to Hallstatt is about 1.000 kilometers, which seemed doable in a week, so I continued making plans and booking camping sites along the way. I knew that the van could drive about 90 kilometers an hour at max, so I took that into consideration.
Little did I know that a renovated VW van still runs on the original engine. The campervan looked super sleek in the pictures, so I expected the engine to run smoothly as well, but that was a naive thought. The VW van was not prepared for two tall Dutchies. Hielke sat really close to brake and had to use all of his muscles each time he needed to use the brake or switch a gear. The seats were fixed and could not be adjusted to our length. The van also did not have power steering and didn’t have a stable roadholding making it very tiring to drive the van. On top of that we were pretty much strangled by the safety belt, which I can tell you is very uncomfortable when you are pregnant and the safety belt is continuously pushing on your bladder.
From the moment that we left with the van, we knew this was going to be a tiring holiday instead of a relaxing one. I knew I had to adjust our travel plans according to our means of transport, but with COVID already canceling all the travel plans we had for the year I just couldn’t give up on the thought of reaching Hallstatt.
Spoiler alert: With a lot of dedication and a lot of love from Hielke because he just wants me to be happy, we did manage to reach Hallstatt. Along the way we stopped at Osnabruck, lovely Rothenburg ob der Tauber and Freudenberg.
The breakdown
I was already pretty disappointed about how our trip started, but I was about to be even more sad, when our van broke down during the second day of our travels. Originally we planned to stay the night in Bremen, but we decided to skip Bremen and drive to Osnabruck instead. Osnabruck was located on our driving route on the way to Hallstatt and we had to do a detour for Bremen which seemed too ambitious with the van.
After a night in Osnabruck we wanted to leave in the morning, but we weren’t able to start the van. When we called the owner of the van what to do, he was still asleep from a night of partying and he didn’t get back to us before 11AM. Luckily, the German road assistance was operating on Sunday morning and came to help us pretty quickly. After some failed attempts, some cables were reconnected so we could continue our travels! Apparently, this usually does not happen, but we were just unlucky. As we rented the van we did have some discussion with the road assistance about our insurance. I guess this was something we should have discussed better with the owner, but in the end the road assistance decided to help us for free.
All in all, I must say this really dampened my mood and I even thought of returning the van to the owner, and driving to Hallstatt in our own car instead. Hielke convinced me to give the van another chance and to continue our adventure.
What else was I naive about?
Just because something looks good, does not mean it sleeps good:
The bed: You could easily transfer the seating area into a bed, however the bed was really hard, plastic leathery and uncomfortable. Being pregnant, it was almost impossible for me to roll-over in the bed without hurting myself. Make sure you check this, before you rent a van!
The smell: The van ran on gasoline, but each time we would speed up a little of the gasoline smell would be released in the van itself. An old van smells super bad and at times we got a bit embarrassed about the smell we made when we left camping sites. We also didn’t have any air conditioning and when we got stuck in traffic we had to open the windows to get some air. I think you can imagine how smelly that gets when everybody leaves their engines running. We decided to wear our face masks against the smell! Again: I would not advise to rent a vintage van when you are pregnant. If little Huug has any long issues when he is born, I know exactly what caused it…
The weather: In our van it wasn’t possible to cook inside, so you had to cook outside. Unfortunately we had quite a few days of rain or cold, making it uncomfortable to cook. Of course, it is possible, but it was not the holiday feeling I was expecting. When the rain and cold disappeared we experienced a heat wave, exactly on the two days that we had to drive a lot. Again, no air conditioning so we got super sweaty. I will leave some gross details out here, but Hielke and I ended up with an infection because of the uncomfortable climate the heatwave created. Luckily, this was not dangerous while being pregnant.
Campings in general: When you have little to no amenities, you are dependent on finding a decent campsite. In our van we had a mini fridge, but it didn’t last very long when we had no electricity, which meant no breakfast the next morning. We discovered quickly that campsite usually have strict opening times, limiting the number of activities and driving you can do in a day. The limitations imposed by campsites, actually caused us to miss out on some activities and we had to incorporate a lot of planning into our holiday.
Nowhere to hang wet towels
Would I recommend hiring a van and what’s next?
Luckily, our whole week didn’t turn out miserable, even though you might think so by reading this post. We really enjoyed all the funny and kind reactions we received about the VW van. On the German highway a lot of cars were honking at us and giving us thumps up and on campsites people were often curious to check out our van.
However, I would advise to let your VW van be the star of your holiday, instead of the destinations. I am sure you can have an amazing experience with the VW van, if you decide to stay local and book a nice camping. The VW van requires slow travel, which is not something I am accustomed to. I like to live my life in high speed and to move from highlight to highlight when traveling. This is impossible with an old VW van.
For us this experience was very educational. We have recently bought a modern Peugeot Boxer and Hielke is converting it into a camper van himself. For us the experience with the VW van learned us exactly what we don’t want and that is knowledge that we actively use when converting our van. We learned the following lessons:
Climate control is key: Hielke already installed a roof fan and is isolating the van as I am writing this blog. He will also install a cookstove, that can also be used as a heater for cold nights.
You need a comfortable bed: We both learned that we are glampers and not campers, so we are installing a comfortable bed in the van. We bought a slatted base at Ikea which we will cover with a thick mattress.
I need indoor cooking: As we have a baby on the way, I want to be able to cook inside our van, so we are not weather dependent. I am usually the one who cooks and I am getting a full kitchen so I can prepare healthy meals when we are on the road.
We like it a bit more sustainable: Hielke has already installed solar panels on the roof of our van, which will be connected to a battery, so we can be off grid for a few days. We didn’t like all the hassles that you get with booking a camping, so this is very important to us. We also didn’t like how smelly the VW van was, so we bought a 2016 van which complies with emission norms that are used in German cities.
Esthetics are still important: I did really enjoy the vintage look of the VW van. We will incorporate some cool design ideas in our van, to really make it feel like a home.
Of course I will do a full blog post when we are a bit further along with the conversion process!
Heel erg bedankt voor het delen van jullie ervaringen en het geven van de tips, Hanneke! Het zorgt ervoor dat Michel en ik onze toekomstige aankoop nog beter kunnen gaan plannen
Fijn dat jullie je eigen Van zo comfortabel mogelijk kunnen maken voor het reizen samen met mijn toekomstige achterneefje
Haha ja deze was echt heel erg basic hoor, dat moet bij je passen 😉 Zag er wel echt super uit… Super leuk dat jullie ook nog bezig zijn met onderzoek. Als onze eigen Van af is komen we hem een keertje laten zien!
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