Assembling Memories:
Resourcefulness Examined
The Van 1.0 Story
In 2010, after returning from a year working and traveling abroad in Buenos Aires Argentina, I started graduate school to study architecture. Shortly thereafter I fell madly in love with the idea of owning a van. Not just any van mind you, but very specifically an 80’s model Vanagon of the variety I’d seen parked along residential streets in Berkeley neighborhoods where I was now living.
The sheer utility! the spaciousness! The sound of the sliding door!
My mind wandered to the endless possibilities, blissfully unaware of the menagerie of mechanical issues that could (and would) result. In this blind state of optimism I decided what my plan would be. I would fly one way back home to Phoenix to visit my family for the winter, and purchase a van in a matter of weeks to drive back to the Bay Area. Van ownership was a mere Craigslist ad away.
…all brilliant plans, perhaps, are hatched in moments of sheer genius, idiocy and or in the spirit of the unknown…
Sure enough, I found my candidate vehicle shortly thereafter. For less than the cost of an affordable laptop, I was now the proud owner of a Vanagon, complete with its original Wasserboxer horizontally opposed engine, and manual transmission. I loaded up my possessions and headed Californi-way to visit a friend at his family winter cabin in Big Bear.
The van ran like a champ, despite being massively underpowered compared to vehicles I’d driven previously, and despite a few warning lights on the dash board, the van made it gloriously up the mountain to Big Bear and within another day and a half I was on my way once more through Los Angeles.
Then disaster struck.
There are a multiplicity of lessons I’ve learned in my van-owning days. Among them is to have any used vehicle you ever purchase checked out by a mechanic before buying. Another might be to check the previously mentioned ‘spirit of adventure’ to make sure it isn’t mental illness disguised.
On the highway somewhere outside Glendale California the dash suddenly lit up all at once with warning lights of a particularly German variety that spoke with a certain urgency that something had gone awfully wrong. The cabin of the van started to fill with a burning steam like smell and I frantically looked for a place to pull over. Upon finding an offramp I turned the now severely overheating engine off and coasted to a stop. While I’d never looked at the engine (rookie mistake #918) I immediately saw the issue. The dry Arizona desert heat had, over the course of many years, dried out the belts that drove the coolant system, and the belt had basically shredded itself.
TEMPORAL CONTEXT
It was my prime directive at the time to make it back to the bay area to catch an important international flight for school the next day at 3pm. The van was out of order, and the time was now 9:30pm. T-minus 17.5 hours until my journey.
Back in 2010 the iPhone 4 had just been released, giving any wanderer the capacity for google on the go, and I frantically began using its browser to search forums, websites, and the like for information on what to do when you loose a coolant belt. After battling AAA for 2 different tows, I was able to find the only 24 hour parts store open that late, and get towed there. The time was now 11:30pm. I purchased a headlamp, necessary socket size, and the required belt (thanks google) and began disassembling the engine I’d never looked at before. Thanks to the friendly forum folks who’d posted diagrams of the engine and steps for it’s reassembly, I was done about 2 hours later.
Cue the 5-hour energy boost. The time is now 1:30am.
If you know anything about vehicles you know that overheating can be deadly for an engine, and sure enough the ‘head gaskets’, a part that seals the engine block to other engine components like the header covers had been compromised in its overheated state. This meant that while the engine would run, it leaked out all the coolant after about 45 minutes like a disgruntled (idealistic) CIA agent.
The impending flight now a matter of 14 hours away I had turned what would normally be a leisurely drive up the I-5 into a nightmarish scenario in which I had to stop at nearly every gas station to buy more water to fill the coolant system of the van. What normally would have taken 6 hours or so to drive was taking way too long. And sleep was nowhere to be found.
Determined to make it to the Bay Area and not abandon my precious overheating Arizona Vanagon special with the sliding door, I drove through the night at a maximum 55–60 miles an hour, angering even the Semi-truck drivers on their night shifts. My attempts to draft behind them to save energy and my precious engine-water worked only occasionally.
I zoomed into the Bay area at approximately 12:00 noon and missed my international flight by about 20 minutes due to missing the BART train. While I was able to depart the next day, it took me sitting exhausted in the airport seating area for approximately 2 hours or so before I was able to even walk. Unbeknownst to me one must be 2 hours early for international flights…
LESSONS IN IMPRACTICALITY
The first thing I learned upon returning to California from my school trip was that in order to register a vehicle in a new state, it must be registered in your name in the state of purchase, something I had not done in my blind state of adventure/optimism. This meant that the van would have a limited lifespan as an unregistered and thereby extra sketchy (candy-less) van with a maximum range of about 8 miles before overheating. I proceeded to park the van anywhere without paying meters, garnering about 25–30 parking tickets in the process, and eventually the van was towed away by the ever watching California transit authorities.
This lesson in van ownership taught me many things (if not years later) about doing your research (even if in the moment) and resourcefulness. I was proud that I had fixed the doomed Vanagon in the middle of the night, and though there are many more details to this story that I’ve recounted to my friends over the years, it stands as a learning experience in what not to do.
Maybe, after searching out all the possibilities known to man, I’ll learn a thing or two yet…
Now to tell the adventure of the Van 2.0 story…
One day
