Bus Life on the Hippy Trail

Me, my (now ex) wife, and my little boy (not yet 2 at the time) travelled from the UK to Nepal and back overland, through Europe, Turkey, Iran, Pakistan and India, in an old bus we bought for £700, and converted for about £2000 more, living on about £400 a month.

I have a tendency to bore people on this subject, but if it's of interest, or if anyone has similar experiences, I'd love to harp on about it

 

wow that sounds like soo much fun! I would love to do that one summer here in Americ. I mean there is soo much here that we don't know about or isn't seen on our regular routes down the high way. I mean i would love to take the backroad....

 

Wow! So how did you heat yourselves? Did you have a wood burning stove or was it electricity? I've a friend who is negotiating to buy an old horse box truck to convert much as you did. I'm sure some problems to avoid and wee tips to a more comfortable ride would be humbly appreciated. We're taking a course in wind turbine construction next March, and he's planning to build a collapsable generator for pit stops and so on, what do you think? Folly or foresight?

 

This year we travled with 4 adults 2 babys (1 and 2) and 4 dogs in a 1989 dodge couchhouse. it was pretty cramped but tons of fun

 

Ok, well construction tips depend a LOT on where and when you're going to use it.

We heated with a coal/log burning stove, but because we wanted to maximise space, and didn't know what we were doing, we built it with the stove on top of a cupboard (properly insulated) and the flue going straight up out of the roof. I thought this was a great idea as it saved costs on the flue material, but
I was very wrong. Turns out (you may know this if you live around log fires) that a good half of the heat comes from the flue! We live on it in the north of england for a year, in a very cold winter, and if the wind was blowing, the flames would actually shoot out of the top of the chimney, but if we had the fire on the floor, and a section of flue running almost horizontally, we'd have got a LOT more heat! We left at the wrong time, and had winter in Turkey, where we were able to buy coal. We also (at a campsite owners suggestion) bought an electric heater there, but it burned out his electrical junction box! The only problem with a stove is finding fuel - I cut a lot of wood in Greece, but couldn't get it dry, and the coal we bought in Istanbul only got us half way across the country. Turkish mechanics make stoves out of biscuit tins, with a big can of waste oil from oil changes dripping through a pipe onto a rag, and they burn wonderfully, and cost them nothing, so we did that for a week or so after we changed the oil. It's horrible environmentally unfriendly though, and without a stove set up for it (with a drip feed) it's also super messy.

You could heat electrically, but it uses masses of power, you'd have to have a generator hooked up. We carried a little generator in the boot which we used sometimes. My advice would be to try to get a truck cab heater. They're like little jet engines, they burn diesel, so they run off your main fuel, and they will keep a truck cab beatifully warm while parked. Webasto also make parking heaters for whole buses, but they're bigger and more expensive (the truck cab ones are expensive enough). I would design my vehicle so that they sleeping area could be closed off (even just a curtain will do) and put my heater there, specially if you're going anywhere really cold.

As far as electricity, we put in as few electrical appliances as possible. We had flourescent tube lights, a water pump (50 gallon tank in the boot/trunk feeding a sink and a shower) and the stereo and that was about it. Our bus (full on 30 foot coach) had a 24 volt system, so we installed a second pair of leisure batteries (these are designed to be drained slowly at low current, unlike the batteries used for starting, which are best at kicking out massive current for a short time), and had a friend put in a relay so they charged off the alternator. We also built a really good battery charger into a cuboard, and set up a switch panel so it could charge whichever pair of batteries we wanted. That way, any time we had an electrical hook up, not only would all our stuff run from the mains, we could recharge all the batteries too.

As far as power generation, a collapsible wind turbine sounds cool, as long as it's not too big when collapsed. I don't know how much power those things generate, but it couldn't hurt. Other good ideas for trickle charging batteries include solar panels (they're getting cheaper) and, if you can get one, there are little radial air turbines (RATS) that aircraft use for emergency power. Those would work ok at highway speeds.

The main thing to remember for a big trip is this. Conventional caravans and motorhomes are designed for a couple of weeks holiday, not years of living on board (we travelled for 2 years). You'll need more storage space, ideally, and make everything REALLY rugged, specially if you're going to the third world. We met so many people driving regular vans that they'd converted, and let me tell you, those things shook to pieces on Indian roads. Even the Mercedes ones were breaking springs (once you've broken one and replaced it with an Indian made one, they'll break again and again. Those things seem to be made of cheese or chocolate). Because our bus was designed to carry 50 people, and there were only 3 (or sometimes 5, with passengers!) people on board, it found the going relatively easy. It was built in 73, and we travelled 1998-2000, so it was almost 30 years old, yet nothing significant broke, even though we accidentally jumped it, all 4 wheels in the air, in the deserts of Pakistan!

We used LPG for cooking and heating water, and were able to get it everywhere in the world. Be prepared to need to buy a new regulator in every country though, they're all different! We found that after Iran it was more or less impossible to find anyplace to fill our water tank, so the shower was not really that useful. We just carried a few jerry cans of water, so that we could wash up. A water filter, purchased in Pakistan, was indispensible - otherwise you spend a fortune on drinking water. In the end, we did most of our cooking outside in the really hot places, on locally made parrafin stoves.

 

I think choice of original vehicle is a big thing too. We started off with something very like this (may even be the same model) http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=14256&item=4507107781&rd=1

But I found myself wishing I'd had something like this:

http://www.leylandexports.com/cgi/display.cgi?10+news

I'd have built a hard body on the back, possibly extending over the cab (although, over rough terrain, the cab and body on these move somewhat independently, so I'd have to be careful!). It wouldn't have had the space we had, but it would have taken us some of the places we wished we could go, and coped much more easily with a lot of conditions. I've been back and working hard in a straight job for 4 years now, but I still have a hankering after one of these.

Worse yet, I sold the bus for not much money, and I know that apart from sprucing up the interior a little (it was pretty tired after 2 years) they guy has left it alone. I'm SO tempted to buy it back!

The best decision we made was to build the furniture ourselves. You wouldn't believe the shaking that stuff gets, so we welded up frames out of box section steel, and then screwed wood cladding to it. It took whatever the road could throw, whereas we met people who had put in chipboard kitchen units that fell apart before they got out of Europe!!

 

As an alternative, if the Bedford M Series I showed above seems expensive, then this:

http://www.rrservices.co.uk/index2.html

Is another option. I doubt that any of these is available in America though, and frankly, unless your going to Africa or Asia, is probably OTT. I wanted to take our bus into the mountains of Pakistan, up into the villages of Nepal and down right to the south of India, but it wouldn't have gone to the former two at all, and the roads in India are so bad that whilst it would have got us to the South, we couldn't face it - it would have been FAR easier in a 4x4 truck.

 

We've been in a converted Blue bird school bus for over a year now. Two adults, three kids and a dog. Traveling the US. A woodburning stove is a good idea, we didn't feel with all the kids and the dog it would be safe for us. We heat with propane and it keeps us nice and warm, its clean and efficient and not to expensive. We really try to keep to warm areas, but have weathered the cold also.
Converting your own is the best way to go, we are also wanting to convert our deisel to run off vegetable oil, a much cheaper and enviromental way to travel. Most motor homes and travel trailers are not set up for a family to travel in for more than a week or two, you can check out our bus and hear about our travels http://thebusfamily.tripod.com/
we don't really have alot up yet but are hoping to add to it as we remodel our bus this winter.

 

You hit the nail on the head Papa Bear - if you want to live on it full time, you need to design it with that in mind. We never found a propane heater that was safe to use in an enclosed area, though we looked. I think it's just not used as much in Europe. We nearly bought one in Turkey, but a Turk told us horror stories about carbon monoxide poisoning in small rooms with the windows shut. I imagine in America, where not every place can get piped gas, you have much better propane heaters available.

And for sure, everywhere in the states I've been, a bus would do fine.

 

We have a nice RV wall mount propane heater, but we took it out for safety reasons (moma was afraid one of the kids would touch it) so we usually just use our propane oven or stove. We do leave a window cracked and we have both smoke dectectors and a Carbon monoxide dectector. We are reworking the set up this winter after traveling for a year we really found out what is needed and not needed. We use propane for our heat, cooking, refrigeration and hot water. We last filled up our propane in late June, it cost us about $40 and we haven't had to fill up since then, its a very cost effective way for us to go. Propane is widely available here, all the americans must be able to have their B-B-Q's. A lot of older retired couples here chose to live in an RV at least part of the year, so RV accesories are fairly easy to come by. We have standard RV plumbing and dump systems, and usually can find somewhere to dump the septic for free. I love my bus home, my family love there bus home and the kids enjoy helping us remodel and decide how best to use their space. We run off of Marine type Deep Cycle batteries, no generator though, We can plug in to any electrical outlet and charge, and I put a newer bigger alternator on the bus engine so that we are charging seperatly all the time we are moving. I am planning on solar panels and very interested in wind turbines, I met a guy that had two wind generators on his bus and it seemed to be working rather well.

 

My partner and I have a 1995 GMC truck with a 1978 UHaul box mounted on the back and converted to an RV. My partner's ex-husband put cabinets in, and I put in a sink, running water, 12V lights, power inverter, front window, roof vent/fan, etc. It's one of those box trucks with an attic over the cab, and that's where our bed is. It's cramped, and so we haul a travel trailer behind it. Lots of room now. We're parked in Oregon for the winter, but in the summer we plan to cross Canada. We've caravaned a bit with Papabear, Mamabear and the little bears and we hope to see them in Canada this summer...

 

We might be having a little raven join us in the summer, but it's to early to tell.

 

omfg i want to just travel the world with the ones i love... i want to so bad.. but im a BIT young... to go by myself anyways..

 

We are still hoping to make it north this winter, I don't know though, things are going pretty good right now and I am making enough money to really set the bus up, so who knows where to next. I think we will be here for awhile

 

Sounds good Sammy

have you seen this site, sounds similair to yourselves

http://website.lineone.net/~mpburke/

 

kinda kewl thread but ummmmm ( well maybe this thread was not meant to go in the direction it leads me too but who cares)

ummm,,,, your now ex wife???? now i figger ya'll probably went on this here trip for spiritual reasons ,to grow,,,etc etc,,,,, and since you aint all that old so it couldnt been too awful long back that yas took this here trip..... n well i just gotta ask was this trip sheer hell on yas in that respect or did babylon hit yas after said trip n yas hadnt actually bonded n such in the way that yas wanted or what ??

 

I'm not an engineer, but I've heard that the loss of power created by the resistance of a wind turbine is greater than the power it could produce, thus the reason we're not harnessing the wind created by 55mph velocity. Unless you mean wind power from when you're not moving.

 

lets hope so........

 

Hey papabear,

Way to live the dream, buddy.

So, I just bought a deisel with the idea of possibly converting it, but where are you planning on getting your vegetable oil? Are you really going to get it from places like KFC's recycle container?

In Tampa, there is a bio-deisel research project at the University of South Florida. They have a vehicle that they say they fill with used french fry grease. Supposedly, you just change some filters or something more often than normal. It seems to me like purer sources of vegetable oil are probably available if one only knew where to look.