How, and why, did we end up in a Skoolie?

The year was 2018. It was pre-COVID, and #vanlife was not yet universally recognized as being hip, but reminiscent of the Chris Farley SNL sketch:

I live in a van down by the river

Paige and I and our then nearly 2 year old daughter were camping our way down the California coast in our pop-top VW Eurovan after having lost out on an 11-acre property near Eugene, Oregon to a better offer. We had wanted to start a homestead, change our lifestyle, and give our daughter (and her brother who was on the way) an experience of what Mother Earth really looks like - in the wild outdoors.

Our old 2003 VW Eurovan Weekender seen to advantage reposing under the redwoods.

While camping in Limekiln (just outside of Big Sur on the California Central Coast) we three were walking down to the beach. As we passed the Campground Host site, something caught my eye. The couple sitting by their bistro table, sharing a glass of wine while watching the sunset in front of their vintage travel trailer was way too young.

My impression of Campground Hosts to that point were that they are retired folk who drive about in golf carts and shake their fists at us young whippersnappers for being too loud. Something like this:

Keep it down

These two weren't anything like that. They were young, vibrant - late 30's or early 40's. We had to pause and ask.

It turns out they had been frustrated with living the daily grind. They sold their stuff, rented out their house, refurbished their little trailer, and headed west. And, since that particular campground was being run by a 3rd party management company, they were being paid to host there.

Wait. What?!

I could be getting paid on top of residual income to camp in one of my favorite campgrounds? Where the hell was my high-school guidance counselor on this one?

Asleep at the wheel

When we got home we started snooping around and discovered a term we fell in love with: Full-Time Family.

But how does a full time family pay the bills? Well, it turns out you do exactly what this host couple was doing - you find a way to have enough residual income and/or remote work and/or side hustles while drastically minimizing your living costs.

But wait, that was before COVID - before most employers would even consider going remote with their employees. And how can life be cheaper?

RV versus Skoolie

We joined forums and groups where full time families were living their best lives. In the RV forums, there were many complaints of broken parts and poor quality components - which I suppose makes sense given that those vehicles are usually used a few days out of each year.

Converting school buses into tiny homes was a relatively new thing (well, not that new, but regaining popularity)

Furthur, and the Merry Pranksters circa 1964

The groups we followed who were using school buses made it clear that these buses were unique and used natural materials - and with far fewer complaints of things breaking. The trouble was that most stories included countless weekends of building out said buses while they were parked in a driveway over the span of two years or more.

We didn't have a driveway. Or two years.

Knowing we had a young child plus one on the way we started looking around for a professional conversion outfit. And remember, this is before everyone and their neighbor had a pimped out Sprinter van in the driveway.

We found only three conversion shops nationwide that were doing school buses. And all three were in or near Asheville, North Carolina.

One of them was available to start a build; and had a few buses to choose from. I flew out, and found our bus - a 1994 Bluebird TC2000 which had just been retired from the Union County School District in Georgia.

I wondered why the builder had sourced the bus from Georgia, when he pointed out an important fact: in Georgia they don't salt the roads for frost and ice - which means the vehicles get a lot less rust on them in their lifetimes.

Appa, far right

And so, we were off on our adventure.

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