Camera: Canon 5D | Lens: EF16-35mm f/2.8L | Setting: f/14, 1/125, ISO 100

I stopped and looked around for another way. He, on the other hand, rolled by me on the passenger side, draped a wrist at 12:00 on the wheel, and entered the sludge at a creep. Life as we knew it unfolded in slow motion. The front tires touched the water and went down. They didn't stop, but they sank with such a dreamy, cartoonish pace that those of us watching had enough time to process, react, and theorize. So, we laughed . . .

If you've been to this space before, you might already know about our little love affair with funky and cool campervans. But this Volkswagen LT 40 inspires a whole new level of bliss and wonder for classic, or not-so-classic, Griswolding. Uh oh, and she's for sale. Alas, she's all the way across the pond in Scotland. It's a 1988 unit that underwent a two year rebuild by a dad who intended to take his family of five through Africa, but as Jed from Campervan Culture tells us, the plans changed. The project was completed in 2010, including a shiny new 2.4 TD motor. It's almost a shame to put so much energy (and cold, hard-earned cash!) into a such a significant project only to have to part with her before a grand voyage. The van in its current state has hardly been driven around the block with a mere 3400 kilometers (2100 miles) on that new engine.

Watch this video and hang on till 0:38 and enjoy the sweet sound of her purr . . .

Somewhere along the road to progress, civilized automotive manufacturers decided the "gas light" was a good thing to add to the dashboard. In most cases when that little red orb illuminates, you're supposed to feel some gratitude but you don't, do you? It's really like getting your final warning. Under the best of situations running out of gas is a downright drag, so a little hey-bro-put-somthing-in-the-tank ought to be a nice reminder; instead it's more of a bummer, the jig is up.

Well. As far as running out of gas is concerned, this was not the best of situations . . .

AEV Conversions Double Cab 4-Door Jeep Brute Conversion

After a moment of hushed awe, may the words of many Jeep addicts, critics, connoisseurs, and paramours fall upon your ears with a smile: this thing is downright sexy. For nearly 10 years now, American Expedition Vehicles (AEV), an inventive if not inspiringly diabolical company in based in Montana, has been producing a much-admired franken Jeep they call the Brute. As simple as I can state it, the Brute is a not-so ordinary converted Jeep with a lift, larger tires and modified body with a pickup truck bed behind the two-seater cab. The awesome of a Jeep packaged up with the utility of a truck. AEV also offers a 470-hp (not a typo) Hemi engine conversion making this beast, in the words of the company's president and founder, Dave Harriton, "more AEV than it is Jeep."

The problem, aside from the colossal ding to your Swiss bank account, is . . .

Summertime in Colorado's San Juan Mountains

You need some kind of contraption to get you and the munchkins to the crag. To the break. To the trailhead. To the put-in. Or you just need a machine to get you down a dirt road that'll get you to a sweet spot on the coast of Baja. But vehicles reach into your life far beyond "a thing to get me from A to B." They become an extension of your personality, for better or worse, and I like to think of it as a delicate coalescence of superfluous love affair and absolute necessity. I could be wrong.

In the quest for the ultimate adventure vehicle, family or no family, love at first sight is rare. Maybe not impossible, but certainly rare. When we bought this 2005 Nissan Frontier Crew Cab, we also had a 2002 bright red Jeep. So I wasn't sure, really, how I'd get along with this new truck. But we drove it home and went about the business of, oh, slowly tweaking some things to make it suitable for our style of travel while adhering to the old wisdom: "Pay no attention to anything not nailed down."

I'm sure there are several lovely ladies out there who see the affection between a dude and his truck and think, "Can that stupid thing shave its legs and look half as good as I do in a skirt? Didn't think so. Neither can the truck."

Conversely, I know more than two or three dudes who want nothing more in life than a pretty lady under his arm, a complete set of 2.4 kids in the backyard, and a Toyota Hilux in the driveway. It's the trifecta of perfection . . .

Oh, come on now, it looks much more complicated than it really is. Though they're atypical, roof top tents could very well be the answer to the comfort woes of those who don't approve of sleeping on the ground. Inside (and up top) is a pleasant foam mattress the size of a queen bed. Plus you'll appreciate that private stand-up space within the walls of the lower room when it comes time to change your underwear, take a shower, or bail out of the rain. As you can see, one entire side of that lower portion also detaches and rolls up; it could also be staked outward in awning fashion giving you a lovely veranda under which to sip morning coffee, listen to songbirds, and get amped up for a bike ride in the pines. Or whatever.

Like all things in life, this comfort comes with a trade off or two . . .

I resisted a minivan for years. Instead I preferred to shove a kid, a dog, a weeks worth of camping/outdoor gear (and on one occasion 3 chickens) into or on top of our wagon. There was zero floor space anywhere, I couldn’t move my feet, rarely could you see out the back window, it smelled like dog breath and because we didn’t have tinted windows I once saw someone taking a photo of us with their cell phone. It was apparently a sight to behold.

I finally caved after Isaac was born. It took one road trip with an additional kid/car seat and I was done, a 2001 Toyota Sienna it was. You may be asking why not an SUV? Well, minivans are just far superior. Theeeey ummm, well, . . .

We're four years into ownership of a 12v refrigerator, specifically an Engel MT35, and there's no shortage of questions about it from our readers who've never seen such a critter. The majority, of course, wonder what the downsides are. Is it really worth while for camping and adventure road trips? Won't it kill your battery? What's wrong with a cooler and ice? Can it really keep popsicles frozen?

Well, read on.

Much as I appreciate dirtbagging, and much as I appreciate my own outfitted truck, I don't see much wrong with just browsing the menu from time to time. At the end of the day, or, rather, come my three-day weekends I go back to my own beloved version of how to git-er-dunn. And it looks nothing like this beauty. Although we do ride in a Nissan. But we don't have a custom camper like this, and our candle light is a campfire when permitted. I like the refinement of those matching drapes and seat cushions. Do your truth.

I know I called this "Camper of the Week."  There's a little voice in my head saying, "YES YES YES YES keep doing this every week." Right now this is a fanciful whim of the moment, but what the heck . . .

Some guys would trade their right arm for a track day in a Koenigsegg, or a garage large enough for one each: a beautiful Aston Martin Rapide, a classic Porche 911, a Mercedes McLaren Roadster, and maybe a Ferrari 599 just to round things out. Seein's how we're dabbling in the not-gonna-happen.

Photo via saddletramps

You might know about my little fondness for campers. Vehicles with not just living space on board, but a sense of style that taps into the heart of your inner creature (or your inner Clark Griswold) who longs to retire early, go to happy places to do happy things. While cars can be an extension of your personality, campers become an extension, or realization, of your dreams.

But yikes. This one's left me speechless and amused and wondering. Sure, it's clearly someone's afternoon musings with Photoshop and a fleeting moment of inspiration. What is it that this camper says? What runs through your mind when you look at it? I think I need your help to sum it up, because all the fun shouldn't be just left up to me.

Caption this sucker, win a Lonely Planet book . . .

Just when you thought I was going totally stupid for posting about station wagons, I ratchet it up a notch and bring you the minivan; okay, I mean a rap about a minivan. You'll enjoy this video.

The age of the station wagon is coming to an end, according to our buds Tom and Ray of Car Talk (actually, it's Jim Motavalli). Maybe you're sighing in relief. Maybe you're saying, "No duh, bro." Maybe you're dropping a tear for those old summer road trips in which you soaked up thousands of miles of paved America, rocking out via Sony Walkman on your head.

But what if station wagons were the ultimate family adventure machine?

"A little about the van. He got it for a steal, but I soon found out why . . . A little electrical work here, reupholstering some seats there . . . But, the restoration wasn’t enough. The van was just the beginning, just a taste of the possibilities. Soon he was talking about traveling around the world. Yes, of course I thought he was crazy at first." - Angela Rehm

Launching a drive through South America by way of a loop around The United States in a camper van with your family - even with little ones you love so much that you ache at the idea of them growing up - is both easy and hard. Easy in this sense: all you have to do is decide, pack your junk, and go. You don't even need a plan or a map. But it's harder on the emotional side, and that's really the part that puts the brakes on for most of us. Once you start thinking about the consequences of your big trip, such as the hit to your savings account, an uncertain financial future, time away from your friends, guilt trips (lovable) from family, and all of that, out come the joyous mid-day nightmares. Right or wrong, that's just the way it is.

Hooking up with a sweet Syncro with Westfalia conversion isn't nearly as easy as it once was. John Franzen consumed three vans and a Jetta to get this one done. Here she is, all gussied up proper-like for Baja.

You don't have to be all that offbeat to appreciate a Volkswagen Bus of any species.  Just a bit.

The window from 1985 to 1992 in the life of the VW Vanagon was a particularly splendid one - coinciding with the pinnacle of popularity of the mullet, that's when Volkswagen produced the full-time 4WD Syncro version. Drool. The really really killer versions were further refined by Westfalia, a German camper conversion company that installed the pop-top camper. Let's put it all together for accuracy, posterity and blatant SEO: Volkswagen Vanagon Syncro Westfalia. All those names . . . if it weren't for the pronunciation, you'd think it was Italian.

John Franzen, a Syncro owner, has a cool story about his van....

I'm the type of guy who believes that cars - when you treat them right - have seductive idiosyncratic personalities that work their way into your heart and force you to fall in love with them. I'm not talking about appearance, or road mannerisms, or the mechanical parts that Dockers-clad engineers craft into a product to sell.  I'm talking about a by-product of the process of buying, owning, maintaining, and driving a car; it's something they just can't put into a bottle and stock on shelves. For instance, you ever notice that a car always drives better with a fresh coat of wax?

So it should come as no surprise to you that I'm kind of a junkie for campers with style - considering how campervanning is one of the coolest and easiest ways to dirtbag with the kids travel as a family.

On my way home from the Mojave National Preserve, not one, not two, but three strangers eyed my truck, slid their sunglasses down their noses, grinned in a funny way, and said, "Well, it looks like you had some fun." Each one, word for word. Must I say it? Yes. Road trips are all about weird encounters. Take the scenes in My Cousin Vinny - a New Jersey-Italian pair thrust into the American South with "mud in da tie-yuz."

Yes, you're looking at two spare tires. Giant ones.  And a canoe. What the hell kind of weekend family camping trip is this, Stephens? Well, it's not.  This is what a round-the-world family camper looks like, and it'll take a little longer than a weekend.

There's just one problem with this photo . . .

Uncle Greg and his ever cute niece, Chloe, take in the sunset on the Sea of Cortez in Baja.  How about his well-packed Toyota Tacoma?

Two things remain the same when you're packing for a trip to the great outdoors:

1. You'll bring the same amount of stuff for one-night weekend getaways under the stars and epic three-week, multi-state adventures; and it will always fill up your storage space to overflowing.

Hannibal and Maggiolina Roof Top Tents on the Beach in Baja, Mexico showing off their custom LED light installations

You know the the major problem with owning a roof top tent - and I don't care if it's an Eezi-Awn, a Camping Lab, a Hannibal, or a Technitop, the problem is the same: they're super comfortable, super easy to set up and take down, and they're super irritating because you're still stuck with a headlamp attached to your head if you have any care at all to read a book or put on some jammies.

Seriously, it's like going to an awesome world famous pizzeria with incredible pie, but you have to bring your own cheese. Or worse, it's like going to Mom's house and having to cook your own meals.

Roof top tents have comfy mattresses, superior tent walls and all that jazz but they don't have lights inside. Which is a deficiency of epic proportions. A giant-sized "WTF?"

It'll be amazing, really, if in 30 years from now 30-something aged bloggers like myself are posting things like, "Dear Mom and Dad - thanks for showing me all the wonders of the indoors when I was a kid." If this VW campervan is what indoors means.

Correlation:

If 2 + 2 = 4
Then "pics and stuff that's cool" + "grew up camping in this" = yet another reason to do cool trips with your kids.

And why not do it in a bit of style and comfort?

That's that.  The caption to this photo when I found it said, "Grew up camping in this."  Nothing more, nothing less. I think that was her way of saying thanks to ol' mom and dad.

Via http://bennettmalibu.tumblr.com/post/1563224372/grew-up-camping-in-this

Madness? Genius?  Something else?

This Piaggio Ape 50 has some serious style. Dirtbagging of yore has some steep competition in the chic department thanks to a German fellow named Cornelius Comanns. He calls this the Bufalino Camper. The Piaggio with a Bufalino Camper is like the overlander's version of a Delorean with a flux capacitor.

Comanns says, "My aim was to give people a better understanding of the country, the surrounding, and the range they have traveled. The traveling vehicle is always with you like some kind of a base camp, while also being used for moving on in an easygoing and spontaneous way."

Once upon a time, loading my backpack with three days worth of food, camping gear, and a pair of Chacos slammed my face with an unyielding grin that only a Monday morning in commuter traffic could erase. Few feelings compare to the bliss you experience while packing for a cool trip, whether it's backpacking or kayaking or a simple afternoon of cragging with the buds. The trucks and campers found at the Abenteuer & Allrad Show in Germany will make your head spin at the idea of packing for an adventure. Meet the Frankenrigs that are the confluence of travel dreams and reality.

You gotta hand it to this dude, Philippe Perakis, the brain behind the swissRoomBox.  He's a former professional mountain biker who, like many of us, found a girl and rather quickly determined that he ought to grow out of the dirtbag lifestyle he'd been enjoying so much. He's come up with something that's going to knock your socks off.