We are: Crystal, a 30 year old kitchen designer and Alexis a 41 year old builder. Together we have built our dream adventure van and beautiful home ‘Vandala, the Live in Luton’.
Vandala started her life carrying rolls of fabric for Kandala Lighting in Derby (see where we got creative with her name!) She spent 20 years in the service of this wonderful family run business before we met her.
Finding the right van was a whole adventure in itself, driving all over the country from Cornwall to Yorkshire, including a spooky sleepover in a 16 bedroom abandoned mansion! Once we found ‘the one’ we began to build. It has taken about two months of building part-time, to have her nearly complete. We have already taken her for a trip around the Netherlands and can't wait to stretch her legs and head off to Russia!
A bit about Vandala:
Vandala is a VWLT35 mwb Luton Box Van.
She boasts 440 watts of solar running through a 40amp mppt solar charge controller. Charging 300 amp hour of leisure batteries, we also have a split charge system running a ‘Renogy’ 40 amp dc to dc smart charger that runs all our electrical items.
For heating she has a bespoke hand crafted log burning stove specifically designed for live in vehicles. For those extra cold mornings when we want heat on demand we installed a 5kw diesel heater.
Her cooking facilities are a Phoenix two hob burner and a gas oven, which is great as we are both massive foodies who love to cook from scratch.
Vandala is fully insulated with 25mm ‘Celotex’, the interior is finished with refurbished ply, skirting boards and Scandinavian softwood cladding.
With a love of all things vintage we have sourced some unique pieces for Vandala, like our vintage jam pan, the sink and a beautiful vintage tin bath that we use as the base of our shower which runs off of a 6l gas boiler mounted on our porch wall.
We are just finishing off our compost toilet to complete our bathroom!
We will be uploading a video tour onto our youtube channel…………...when we have completely finished the the build.
You can see more of our adventures in Vandela and of van life with our three dogs on
Instagram: https://www.instagram/roadside_van_life
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/roadsidevanlife "
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