You Won't Believe The Stunning Van This 79 Year Old Solo Female Built!!

hello globies I am here at the women's RTR and I met someone that I just had to interview and introduce you to her name is Kate and she built out a 136 inch ProMaster herself you're not gonna believe it she's 79 years old but she is just phenomenal and I tell you when you see this build you're going to be so impressed but you're going to be even more impressed with her and I can hardly wait to bring her to you so you know what without further Ado let me go ahead and let's start this tour of Kate's amazing build and let me introduce you to her oh Kate hi Carol it's so good to meet you here at the RTR and you did a beautiful build and we're going to show that in this video but just a little bit about you you were telling me you do have a home base at one of the escapees locations where you can buy in and so you stay there but you have there you have what did you say eight by Twenty trailer uh an eight by twenty four eight by Twenty Four trailer and that's for when you want to be stationed area for a bit but then you hit the road in this beautiful van and I feel like I have more room here than I do in that eight by 24 trailer so you are living tiny whether you're on the road or not on the road yeah oh my goodness so how long did it take you to build this out well it's rainy Oregon so uh it took me a year but it wasn't you know it wasn't a whole year I'd spent a month or here or there where I didn't do anything because it was too cold and rainy and miserable to be outside working so probably about three months of actual work okay I would say now you said that you had built out a van before yes so this was your second one so in this one you knew what you wanted more exactly okay and I made a lot fewer mistakes not not perfect but a lot fewer now would you consider yourself a carpenter by trade oh no but I I'm a chainsaw Carpenter that's what I call myself all right well you know what I think without any further delay we need to show everyone this beautiful beautiful van that you built out and you were saying that you built it out with the exception of a couple of things like that's an Ikea set of drawers and you didn't do the electrical but everything else you did in here I had a huge amount like I would say I was the helper with the ceiling okay the walls the floor the furniture I did all that yeah okay well you know what let's go and have an in-depth look at this beautiful home on wheels that you've created when I look at this and you say it's not finished I'm like are you kidding me it's so stunning so you know what let's just show the viewers everything that you've done in here now these cabinets here are drawers rather you have six drawers here yes and you built those yourself yes I did not cut the long pieces I did all the drawers myself but I didn't have not have the equipment to do these long pieces so a friend cut those for me okay um but these have you'll notice they have little this is what keeps them from coming out because these are not these are just boxes basically that go in there and there are dowels that hold them in place because these are not real cabinets the way most cabinets are built this is just a box it slides in okay and this is just a dowel and I bought some beads from Michael's and glued them on top okay so that's what keeps these from flying out wow now you are telling me I'm going to move this here these hats but you are telling me that you this is was a mistake I'm looking because that's one of my favorite things in the whole van now so what happened and how did you come to make that piece well I had cut that wrong and so it just didn't look right and I said well maybe if I if I make something I have a scroll saw so I was able to you know cut this out Design This and cut it out and then paint it and uh so that's that's a mistake that's a mistake that's right what a mistake to cover up something but that turned out to be just beautiful oh my goodness moving along I'm looking at the ceiling and the walls and it reminds me of a log cabin it's just beautiful what kind of wood is this this is just Knotty Pine and this is not even the um the half inch that they usually usually use I think it's 5 16 of an inch okay and I wanted that because it's lighter and I wanted to make this as light as possible lightweight as possible and I'm looking over here and you have these like indentions or I don't know indentions I don't even know if that's a word but it has it goes into the wall here so you have the space behind what would normally be the wall there for cutouts on either side right and the reason is this is a major structural component that cannot be removed okay but these are there was something in here that could be removed okay so I just went ahead and left that obviously the brace there the support beam and when you get these professionally done normally because they're in a hurry they will just go from here all the way to there and right so you don't have all this space with that going further into the wall area than normal do you have insulation in your walls yes yes it still has insulation in there what kind of insulation did you use I have the rigid foam board that has a reflection on one side and just it's just a white rigid foam okay and you have one inch you said yeah I think it's an inch it might be a half an inch okay and that's adequate you find I find it's adequate now I have more in the ceiling I'm looking at your bed and this little thing kind of actually divides the kitchen section from the bedroom it's like kind of like a a mental divider there how did you come up with that and what made you decide to do that and how did you make this bed well this bed was supposed to originally be one that I could slide out and have it a larger bed and that I just could not get that to work the way I wanted it to so these are here basically because it's a pretty high bed right and it'll keep me from falling oh okay so let's keep you from falling out but it actually provides the visual separation from the kitchen and it looks like into a bedroom area I like it too and um you're an old lady like me you don't want to fall out of this now the foam on this you were telling me you have six inch foam and on top of that because I was feeling that and it's so soft and it feels so comfy what is that that's on top of there that is something called it's from a company called Sleep on latex and it is a one inch topper and when I first put in just the six inches it was not that comfortable but when I put this one inch only in there it now is more comfortable than my bed at home now what is the name of that again it's the brand name is sleep on latex and that's the company and I think as far as I know that's the only thing they make is mattresses like Toppers and mattresses I I'm gonna get one of those they are they're really great they're a little bit pricey I think that was close to a hundred dollars but it was for a good night's sleep yeah well let's look it over at your kitchen here and in your kitchen you have a sink now do you have a water pump under there I presume what I have and I'll show you in the back here okay I Anna in it I have um uh a submersible little pump and then how does that go from all the earth I have tubing that goes around here oh okay and then it goes to the sink set of drawers here you said is from Ikea that's one of the few things that you didn't make in here that's right I mean you had to assemble it but right now how do you keep that closed well these do not have any kind of a stop on them so it's really important obviously to keep them closed and this it's got a some very strong magnets on it oh so that a piece of magnet on that that's what a one inch by half inch yeah probably a one inch yellow one inch by half inches okay and then the magnets on there magnetized to that yeah no matter how much one of them wants to come out it would have to bring out all of them and that never happens okay all right keep them all in check so now can we look and see what you cook with I'm seeing over here that you have an induction stove that's a portable induction this is a new wave import up a portable that's not the one I use most of the time although I do use it I generally use my butane oh I love my butane I do too I like the butane stove so you use that from time to time well speaking of that since that takes power what kind of power do you have in here I have um a two 100 amp hour lithium iron phosphate battery so that they're pricey but they are worth it but now you are telling me you only have 100 watts of solar on the right that's correct I do and it's that's amazing to me but that one solar panel so far has kept up with all of my needs wow you can see right there I've got 99 point eight percent power right right and uh it stays that it rarely goes below that so you must have be in places where you get a fair amount of sunshine I do but even when it's a really cloudy it's surprising how much that solar panel will pull in anyway see you have an angle refrigerator they have a very good reputation how do you like yours I love it and it was a lot more expensive than some of them yes it is but everything I've read suggests that they are the best and this one actually this is I think a 48 liter or something and it it has a freezing apartment oh okay that fridge here or I can make it all freezer or all fridge or I can switch them around so the refrigerated part is a small one and the freezer part is a large one so are there all kinds of options on this who are telling me that that refrigerator as big as it is and having the freezer section two it barely sips any power that is true and if this if we have full sun and this is at 100 percent it will not drop below 99.9 percent when this is going because the sun is you know the solar panel is keeping up with uh recharging faster than this is because it takes so little power yeah that's amazing it's amazing is right it I love this it was it was about a thousand dollars and that's a lot more expensive than some of them but I had looked at this and I said you know I've already built one van and it was it was okay but it wasn't exactly what I wanted and I figured you know I'm pushing 80 really really close to pushing me and I I did not I don't think I'll ever do this again so go ahead and do what I want and have something I'm going to really be happy with that makes perfect sense oh you know I would be very remiss if I did not ask you about like you said everyone's favorite subject how do you go to the bathroom in your van and you said for solids that's really in an emergency right so can you show us what you use because it's people are going to be exactly they're going to crack up I use my trash can and I can set myself down you know you have to be careful but it works this is just emergencies so what about the other how do you use the bathroom otherwise and you know as an old lady I find that I need to use this a lot so the fact that you have to use it a lot and you're still using this method says it works for you it works you know I see people with these porta potties and then like I just don't want to have anything to do with those okay I have this is a Dollar Tree um this is my ladies urinal you can you can use your imagination okay it works yes um I don't have a black water tank of course but I do have a yellow water tank okay all right it started Life as a biscotti container from Costco so this works for you you know what whatever works for you you know that's right and this is the Ram ProMaster 136 136 inch so it's this short one you know what we're going to be ending this but there's one thing I wanted to show before they end and I am going to get some of these you can't remember the name of the place where you got it but it was in Portland and but we're gonna find out and add that but I want to go over and show these window um ventilation system this is one of the features I really wanted to show on your van the ventilation system on your windows so let's go ahead and open that and show people how that works basically you've got this system that goes onto your window can you show us how it goes on how how you insert it okay yes so you put it on the window down when it's kind of halfway yeah and then it adjusts itself yeah it just works and then you've got ventilation on one side and then I'm going to go around and look on the other side and then you've got it's kind of a bug screen too and it's also prevents rain wow so you have it open in the rain and you can have it open when it's really hot and oh my goodness and you have one of those for both of your front windows right wow well you said you're not done and you had a couple more things you're going to do and you're going to add a table and a few other things but I'm looking at this again and I can't see where it needs one separate iota of a little thing but when you do Remodel and not remodel but do add a couple of additional additions can we come back and can I show my viewers your new additions you can and one thing I can tell you that I would change I probably won't now but you can see that these they they kind of get off and if I had put those on there you wouldn't be able to tell okay so you would put knobs on instead of those knobs on instead of those okay because those it's obvious if you're off just a little bit you know if it well I'm going to tell you something I think everyone who's ever had a van built or built one out if that was the only thing that they thought was a problem if they're a fan they would be thankful very thankful my only problem but oh my goodness well thank you so very much Kate and we will be checking back with you uh when you do your upgrades and and see what they look like okay all right we'll see you down the road okay thank you Carol bye-bye

Channel: Glorious Life On Wheels

Views: 406,468

Keywords: tiny house, tiny home, van build, rv living, van life, solo female rvers, female van life, senior van life, camping, solo female van life, nomads, RTR, cheap rv living, boondocking, stealth camping, minimalism, budget living, senior, seniors, burning man

Id: 7bDFgwlRWJk

Length: 16min 34sec (994 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 13 2023