Who doesn’t love watching a good reno project? When we heard that Nate & Bec couldn’t find the dream caravan for their lap and had decided to buy an old van, completely gutter it and build it themselves, we all got super excited and can’t wait to see what they come up with… Meet the Bush family – Real Stories | Real Families.
Hey guys, we are the Bush family from the TheFam4Adventure. Our little adventure family consists of Nate, Bec, Savannah (6) and Theo (4). We live in South East Sunny Queensland and love getting out and about, and exploring this amazing part of the world we live in. To date we have not managed to venture more than a few 100kms from home with our trusty tent, but all that is about to change as we prepare for our big lap of Australia.
To go back 10 years… Nate started studying at Uni the year after we got married, he was studying full time and working full time throughout his engineering degree, and was then either working long hours or working away, and more recently running a small business. Needless to say there were some weeks and even months where he just didn’t really get to see the rest of the family; and this was one of the main factors that influenced our decision to pack up and set off. Bec, a hairdresser before becoming a full time mum has been busy running our little adventure family, and is always looking for ways to get the four of us together and outdoors, and what better way to achieve this than load us all in a caravan and trek off with no set date to return.
Travelling Australia has always been something we have dreamed of doing but never looked at it as being feasible at this stage of our lives, it was always in the pipeline for the retirement era. It wasn’t until last year we had been away for the weekend at a good friend’s wedding, when we said to each other life is just too short (YOLO) let’s just go, what’s the worst that could happen…
Exciting times ahead, but It didn’t take long for reality to kick in when we started looking at getting a caravan, upgrading the tow vehicle, leaving work, leaving our family, taking Savannah out of school, financing a life on the road, and the list goes on. But despite all these cons, the pros still seemed to be well ahead.
Fast forward back to today and we have closed the business down, sold the work ute, purchased a Landcruiser, picked up a caravan, enrolled Savannah in distance education, and are still assuring our parents they will see their grandchildren again.
After countless hours of looking at caravans online, hours in the sun walking around caravan expos, talking to I don’t know how many caravan salesmen we finally decided the caravan we wanted just wasn’t out there (at least in our price range). And what do you do when you can’t buy what you want? You build it of course. So we picked a cheap 20 foot van and completely gutted it so we can start from scratch and get the layout we want to suit us. We will be upgrading the suspension, replacing the floor, installing all new plumbing and electrical components, building the bunks, our bed, the BBQ, the toilet, enough storage for all of us and the kitchen. We spent a long time deciding on the best layout, but finally have a plan to get it set up. The van is currently a work in progress.
The tow vehicle is a Landcruiser 105 series, which will also be going through some fairly significant changes. We are converting it from petrol to diesel to run the 1HD-FTE engine and manual gearbox, the old grey cloth interior is being swapped out for some much nicer tan leather seats and trim. We have installed a secondary rear AC condenser and run some mid and rear row air con vents to help keep the car cool. We have also fitted up a long range fuel tank, installed lifted suspension with air bags to help carry some of the extra weight, as well as a few other goodies to help us along the way. We will also be setting the car up so we can leave the caravan and explore some of the more remote locations for a couple of days at a time.
Our children are our life and we would do anything for them. They love our family adventures as much as we do, and seeing them building a sandcastle on Fraser Island or jumping into the freezing cold creek at Gordon Country is honestly the happiest we get to see them. Weather its eating dinner on a grassy peninsular watching the sun go down over the ocean, sitting around the camp fire during winter toasting marshmallows or looking for shooting stars during the new moon, we just want to do more of it. These are the most precious moments that we as parents have and they will be gone in the blink of an eye as our two little adventure buddies grow, and will soon be off on their own journey. We feel at 6 and 4 years old they will get so much out of travelling with us, seeing the country side and leaning some good life skills along the way. Let’s just hope they don’t mind a few hours in their car seats.
Living in South East Qld we are very blessed as there is enough around to accommodate most keen adventure seeking family’s for some time. We have been to and explored Fraser, Moreton and Stradbroke Islands and absolutely love the beach. We have trekked North into some beautiful coastal national parks, west in to the Great Dividing Range and set up camps in a variety of places from some of the most stunning mountain top locations to the picturesque valleys alongside fresh water creeks, even South over the border. Despite living around all these amazing camping locations we know there is so much more to see and explore in this great big country. We are so excited to see so much, however a few of the top spots for us will include, Kakadu the Kimberly, so many beaches along the western coast of WA, the high country, Tasmania and the four extremities, Cape York, Shark Bay, Byron Bay and Wilson’s Promontory.
We often ask each other what each of us is looking forward to the most about a life on the road, and we both seem to agree that just being able to slow down, enjoy the simpler things and not worry about the daily grind, keeping up with the Jones’s, or deadlines. Just being relaxed and content with what we have and where we are, where ever that may be at that particular time. We have been so busy for so long, and the next few months won’t be any better, putting the car back together, finishing of the caravan along with all the other final preparation before we leave. But we know that the day we drive out the driveway for the last time, in who knows how long, it will just be the four of us and whatever we can fit in the van, nothing more nothing less, and it will be great.
BRING IT ON!!
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