Back in December, I asked you to vote for your favourite van featured on the VW Camper Van Blog throughout 2009. We had a wide range of different vans to choose between from Split Screens and Bay Window Single Cabs right through to Type 25 Campers and T4’s.

Well… the votes have been official counted and verified and I am pleased (and not surprised) to announce that the winner of the VW Camper Van Blog Readers Ride of the Year 2009 is… (drum roll), Bob’s 1967 21 Window Split Screen Microbus which was featured back in August.

Coming in a close 2nd was Amy’s 1969 Low Light Early Bay Window Camper Van from September and in 3rd place was the unusual 1979 VW Type II Bay Window Camper Van owned by Orville which was featured in November.

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Well… I had intended to be publishing a blog post this weekend advertising my VW T25 Camper Van for sale. After 5 years of ownership I was feeling like I needed a change. I had been toying with the idea for a while and as I had originally wanted a Bay Window Van when I stumbled across my T25, the thought had always been in the back of my mind that perhaps I should have gone for a Bay instead.

This is not to say that I have not thoroughly enjoyed the time I have been a ‘wedge’ owner as I have. We have had many great holidays away in our Type 25 Autosleeper and have completed a great deal of work on the van over the last 5 years, so much so that the van is in much better condition now than when I bought it! I was just starting to get the feeling that I wanted a change.

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Wow, so where did January go? What with lots of work on, a weeks holiday and an awful lot of snow, this month just seems to have flown by so I apologise for the lack of updates to the VW Camper Van Blog lately.

Anyway, I have something a bit different for you in this, the first VW Camper Van Blog article of 2010. As regular readers will know, I am a graphic designer by trade and as such I have quite an unhealthy obsession with Apple Mac related products. So when I received an email from Paul at Veloce Publishing regarding a new iPhone app he had developed on the subject of VW Buses and Campers, I jumped at the chance to ‘take it out for a spin’ to see what it was really like.

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We have had a wide variety of vans submitted in to the Readers Rides section throughout 2009 from pristine Split Screen Vans through to stunning T4’s with a whole load of T25 Work Vans, Bay Window Pickups and Custom Built Camper Vans in between. So I thought it was about time to figure out just which one is the best.

We have had photos of 16 VW Vans sent in during the last 12 months, each of them unique and loved dearly by their owners, but which one deserves the crown of the VW Camper Van Blog ‘Readers Ride of the Year 2009′?

The nominees for Readers Ride of the Year 2009 can be viewed on the link below. Once you have had a good look through them, you can cast your vote at the bottom of the article. The winner will be announced on the 31st January 2010. 

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This weeks Readers Rides comes from Orville Smith from the United States. Orv contacted the VW Camper Van Blog a few weeks ago about a custom conversion he performed on his 1979 VW Type II Van a number of years ago. After reading the detail Orv went in to when converting this Volkswagen Van into his ‘Ultimate Camper’ I thought I had to share it with you. The van does not look like the majority of Bay Window VW’s we see in the scene (lowered / alloys / etc), but the extras Orv fitted in to his van meant it had to be included in the Readers Rides section.

From here I will pass over to Orv who explains in great detail the many hurdles he had to overcome whilst installing the numerous improvements he made to his Volkswagen Bay Window Camper Van in order to suit his needs:

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I recently got chatting to a VW Van enthusiast I met on Facebook called Martha. She started telling me about an amazing project she and her friends were working on. The project was simply to build the world’s largest VW Van.

The idea was conceived after returning from Burning Man 2008, an event that brings together artists, hippies, and cool people of all backgrounds from around the world to celebrate life. Martha explains, ‘Each year artists create “mutant” vehicles that can be driven during the annual Burning Man event.  Kirk Strawn, Rob Larson and their families attended Burning Man in 2008 and witnessed first hand the unbelievable creativity unleashed by the mutant vehicle artists and wondered what they could build to take to the event in 2009′.

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Back in August we featured Bob Cropsey’s 1967 21 Window Split Screen Microbus which I know you all found amazing. Well in that article the keen eyed among you may have noticed a rather tidy looking Bay Window Pickup lurking next to the awesome Split Screen bus.

Based on the amazing work Bob had done on his Split Screen and bearing in mind the amount of award winning show vehicles Bob has had (not to mention the book he has written on VW’s), I thought it has to be worth taking a look at the early Bay Window Singlecab he uses as his daily runner. Bob has once again been kind enough to send in some photos of the pickup so here it is… Read the rest of this entry »

I have finally gotten around to looking through our photos of this years Vanfest event. Unfortunately, we had to go up in the car as our T25 was off the road at the time. We stayed in a Travel Inn in Gloucester so I can’t say we got the full effect and atmosphere of the event, but it was fun nevertheless.

The vans on display in the ‘Show and Shine’ competition were truly inspiring. I think my favourite had to be the incredibly low rat style red Split Screen. However, the ‘Pool Bay Hooker’ Bay Window was also very cool as was the immaculate Komet (I think) T25 with the hard side pop top and the cool 80’s stereo and badminton rackets inside.

As I said, it was a bit of quick stop off for us before getting back on the road so we only had about 5 hours at the event but I thought I would share some of the photos we took on the day.

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his weeks Readers Rides comes from Amy from Kendal in Cumbria who shows us her1969 Low Light Early Bay Window Camper Van named ‘Dolly’.

Amy loves her van so much she has decided to share it with the world by hiring it out for camping holidays in the Lake District or Yorkshire Dales. For more information regarding hiring Dolly, please visit their website.

About the van

Dolly is a 1969 early bay, type 2 Volkswagen camper van. She has a reconditioned engine so she goes a bit quicker than when she left the factory.

Dolly was born in Germany but lived in South Africa in 1969 and in her early years she was painted Red. We started the restoration in 2005. She changed colour to what you see now and has been known to win Best in Show awards.

Dolly has a reconditioned air cooled engine but her heart is still 40 years old.

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