Van Build Series: Week 1 - Picking Up Sophia

Hello and welcome to our new website! Let me introduce you to our new whip – one very lovely Mercedes Sprinter Van. 7 years old, 53,000 miles on the clock, named Sophia. We actually bought her while we were out in Bali, in April 2019. We’d made the decision about 2 months into our Asia trip that we were going to do full-time van life when we got home. About a month before we were due to fly back, Ben kept seeing this Sprinter van for sale that was everything we were looking for. Low mileage, great bodywork, one previous owner… we waited about a week and took the plunge, as the good vans don’t stick around long. Two days after we landed, jet-lagged and exhausted, we picked her up – our new home on wheels! She is everything we were looking for. Needless to say, we got started converting her straight away. Of course we had to visit family and catch up on everything we’d missed in 10 months of being away, so the van took a backseat to all that family time.

Our first van jobs…

Some of the things we managed to do included drawing up a rough floor plan and removing the wall panels, the bulkhead and the floor. One of the torque screws in the floor was stuck, so Ben had to angle grind it down to get it out, but that’s all we’ve really managed to do so far. I labelled the panels 1-10 so we know at a glance where they fit, and we can use them at a later date for templates when we do the interior. Ben is also the only one driving her at the moment, thanks to ridiculous insurance prices. To add me onto the insurance was coming out at £200+ extra per month, so I’ll have to wait until she’s officially a campervan before I get behind the wheel. We’re now based in Devon, so Ben had a baptism of fire getting her down some pretty narrow country lanes.  I can’t wait to get her kitted out and I’m counting down the days to when we can drive up Dartmoor, make some dinner and sleep under the stars. Time to get to work!