VAN TOUR - Solo Female Van Life - The Ultimate Cozy Build for Full Time Living

What's up, everybody? I'm Sarah. This is Koaw. We live in the Sprinter van full-time. I know Koaw doesn't look that excited, but I made him sit here. He wants to be outside, but I'm excited. So today we're going to do a full van tour. I'm going to show you all the ways that I pack and organize the van for full-time living. What do you think, buddy? Want me to let you back outside? Okay, go. Many of you are probably here for my short-form content. Thank you so much for joining me over here. I'm excited to do a weekly YouTube video from here on out. Some of them will be super informational, and then some of them will just be vlogs, day-in-the-life kind of stuff, so you can see what Koaw and I's life is like on the road. We're going to start on the outside. I'm going to show you the vehicle itself, and then we're going to come inside and do a tour. The van itself is a 2022 Mercedes Sprinter 2500. It's a 170 wheelbase, not the extended version. I got it directly from the Mercedes dealership, and then I took it to Tommy Camper Vans in Phoenix, Arizona. They did the whole build-out. It was awesome. I picked one of their layouts, but I was still able to customize how many drawers I wanted, where I wanted the cabinets, where I wanted the fridge, stuff like that. I did a lot of the design of the layout, which was awesome. Then I was able to put some little finishing touches. I swapped out. They usually do black hardware, but I really wanted copper hardware, so I kind of brought that to them, and they made that happen, which was awesome. Hey, buddy. The vehicle is stock. I don't have anything added to it. It's not lifted or tires or anything like that. The only thing I did add was this little rock chip shield up here. The ladder and the roof rack are both from Tommy Camper Vans. They manufacture those in-house. I'm going to take you up to the roof and show you what that looks like first. This is the front portion of the van. I'll explain everything that has been installed there, and then this is a roof deck, which is awesome. I spend a lot of time hanging out up here. Here I have 300 watts of solar, so each of these panels is 100 watts. They're Renogy panels. Right here in the middle is a max air fan. I use that when I want to open the windows and just circulate air through the van, and when it's really hot outside, I use the air conditioner, which I'll show you here in a second. It's in the back portion of the roof. Right up there is Starlink Mini, and that has been the most game-changing thing that I have installed since I've got this van. Since I'm working full-time remote right now doing content creating, it is an absolute must. I have it mounted up there on a mount from Savage UTV. It's a quick-release mount. I love it. I can take it on and off if I need to. Lastly, up here at the front is a SimpliSafe security camera installed over there, and then on this side is an exterior light. There's also one on the back, so those two lights illuminate where the side door is. Now I'm just going to flip you around, and I'm going to show you the back half of the roof. This is a Dometic RTX 2000 air conditioner. It works awesome. I love it. I do use it sparingly just because it does pull a lot of power, which is to be expected. I use it mostly when I need to leave Koaw in the van and it's hot outside. So if I have to go to the grocery store, if I want to go work in a coffee shop or something like that, it keeps the van really cool. Also back here you can see that other exterior light that illuminates where the side door is, and then these are back lights. Fun fact, they don't work anymore because I stole their wiring to wire the Starlink, which was a great trade-off because I never really use these, and I use the Starlink all the time. Lastly back here, you can't see them super well, but I have two outdoor cameras right here from the system Blink. Another fun fact is that the SimpliSafe one that I showed you up there is actually a decoy. I intended for it to work, and I do have a SimpliSafe system for arming the doors in the van, but that thing kept breaking, so I wound up just leaving it alone as a decoy, and I got the Blink system, which has been working perfectly. This is what I call the garage. So on the exterior here, I have an outdoor shower, which I don't use very often because I shower inside the van, but I use this all the time for bathing Koa. And then here is how I fill my water tank. So there's one hose that goes from here to the spigot that I'm using, and then another hose that goes from here into the water inlet, which is right here. The reason that there's two ports right here is because the water actually goes through a filter before it goes into the tank. And I'll take you inside, and I'll show you a closer look at that, but that is how I fill my water tank right there. And then let's go inside. We'll crawl in there and see if I can't give you a better view of what I organize and what I pack in there. All right, we're going to crawl in here. And so in these backpacks, first things first, this big blue one is actually all camping gear. I have everything that I would need to go backpacking and sleep in a tent. I don't do that very often, to be honest, but I have all the gear, so I have it with me just in case. This is a full set of toiletries and towel and face cloth, everything that I need to just grab and go and shower when I want to shower outside the van. So Planet Fitness or a recreation center or something like that. This is my main hiking backpack. It's already packed with bear spray, knives, tissues, chapstick, poop bags, a med kit for Koa, all sorts of stuff. So this is just packed and ready to go. This is a day hiking backpack, so a little bit smaller. Sometimes if I don't want to take this, if I'm going on a really short hike, I'll take this. But to be honest, this thing is so awesome and comfy and already packed, so I use this most of the time. So those are my backpacks, and I'm actually going to take them and throw them over here for a second so that you can see some other stuff. So this is the filter that I was talking about. So it's Clear Source Ultra. They do make a mini one now. I love this filter. When I got this, they didn't make the mini, but highly recommend it. But get the mini if you're in a van or an RV because it's smaller. It just makes sense. So this filters the water before it goes into the tank. This is 30 gallons of fresh water. And then up here, this is a four or five gallon, I'm not sure, ISO temp hot water heater. And this runs off of electric. So I have to turn, there's a dial inside and I turn it on and it runs for about 20 to 30 minutes before the water is heated and ready to go. You should see Koa right now. What do you got, buddy? Koa, what are you doing? Okay, sorry, we're back. He was being so cute. So yeah, hot water, turn the dial 20 to 30 minutes and it's ready to go to take a hot shower. Also up here, I have Koa's dog wash and a towel to dry him off because like I said, I do bathe him quite a bit, usually every time I do laundry. And then I have some microfiber towels down here just in case spills and stuff like that. Also in here is peppermint rodent repellent because mice are always trying to get in here. Some natural insect spray, some Goo Gone, for some I use that all the time, a knife and a headlamp. These are stakes and a hammer for my outdoor mat, which is right here. And then also behind me, you can kind of see it's just two bags of Koa's dog food, a tool bag because I'm always fixing things. Everybody who does van life, I think is always fixing things, very common. And all the way in the back there are the cartridges for the toilet. Okay, I'm surrounded by backpacks back here, but up here I have my hoses. So I really should get a more collapsible hose. I just haven't figured that out yet, to be honest. This does fit here, so it's been fine. And it's water safe. I was having a hard time finding a collapsible hose that was for drinking water. So I don't know, but I should figure that out at some point. I have a shovel here and I have some recovery tracks. I don't know if anybody, if you've been following me on short form content for a while, I did get stuck pretty recently in the sand. So I have two sets of some tracks here just in case that happens again. Although I know better when it looks like the sand is going to be too deep. We're all learning, okay? And then these are just some leveling blocks. And then underneath there, I have something to plug into shore power, which I don't do very often, but those are kind of all the little functional things. And they actually fit very nicely. It looks like a little Tetris game in there. This, I'm not going to open these up, but it's essentially like nicer clothes, like all my jeans and sweaters and cute tank tops and stuff like that. Things that I don't wear all the time, but I like to have with me because I like to wear sometimes. Let's see, I'll open this top one. Yeah, so this is like a beach blanket. This blanket I use for Koaw when I'm washing his other blanket. And then just jackets and bathing suits. And then underneath this one is more like extra toiletries. And actually this bottom one is kind of empty, not completely empty, but there's room in it. So I do have a lot more storage than I really, to be honest, I don't have this van packed full and I don't really want it to be because I have exactly what I need. Up here is the electrical system. So I'll just briefly go over this for those of you who know about van electrical and just want to hear the tidbits. And then I'll do a full YouTube video on my full van electrical. So here I have 600 amps of lithium battery. And then I have a 3000 watt inverter. I have a 50 amp DC to DC charger. I have 300 watts of solar. And yeah, that's about it. So that's kind of the overview of the electric. Under here, I have some lights that I installed, which is really nice. There's three going across the back. They're battery powered because when it's dark out, you can't see anything back here. So these lights are essential. And yeah, that's the garage. We're going to start up here and move our way to the back. So this is the cab area. And as you can see, it is nice and clean and empty, which is the way that I keep it. A lot of solo van lifers I know will store things in their passenger seat, but I just prefer it to be nice and empty and clean when I'm driving. So I don't really have much up here, but I do have a little vacuum that I use multiple times a day. I do have an Amazon storefront, by the way, for you're going to see a lot of things that you might wonder where they're from. And quite a lot of it is actually from Amazon. So you can check that out if you want. Everything else I'm going to link. I will just link as much as I possibly can. Obviously, nothing is sponsored because I don't have quite the following for that yet. Maybe at some point we'll see, but I'll make sure that you guys have links to everything that's in here. And it's all stuff that I have just bought and that I love. So over here, I have fanny packs. I'm a fanny pack girl through and through. I have a bunch of different ones for a bunch of different needs. And then up here, I do have some storage, just cables and tissues and pepper spray and laundry coins, fun stuff like that. And that is it up here. And now I'm going to show you one of my favorite things that I installed after the build out is this headliner shelf. So I don't know the company off the top of my head, but again, I will find it. My favorite thing about this headliner shelf specifically is that it has this curtain so I can pull this curtain across and just get some quick privacy. I won't pull it across all the way right now, but I love this thing. And I pull this curtain every single time I leave the van. So grocery store, coffee shop, running an errand, anytime I leave the van, I pull this just so that people can't see directly in the van. I know it already looks built out just from there being a roof rack and whatnot, but when the copper faucet is gleaming through the windshield, I just feel like it's more of a target than not. So I love that this is so easy to pull and I can just quickly get some privacy. And then obviously this gave me a ton of storage. So I have all my sweatshirts here. And then over here, I have self-made window covers for these two long windows that are on the side here. And then I have my grocery bags underneath here. I have this covers the max air fan that is right above there. This is nice for the Walmart parking lot nights when the light is gleaming in through the ceiling. And then over on this side, I have Koa's bin, which is awesome. It's right next to the door, so it's easy to access. And I just have his brush, wet wipes, his collars, balls, leashes, everything like that. Right behind there is one more little bin that has winter gloves and hats in it. And then other than that, I have my, these are from Living in the Bubble. I got them on Amazon and I love these. These are insulated window covers. I have two stored up there, one for the passenger window, one for the driver window. And then I actually do have the windshield insulated cover as well from there, but I store that in the shower. And that's it. Let's keep moving. This is my dinette area. So these seats swivel around and then I have this table mounted on a lagoon mount. And the awesome thing is that it is really easy to remove. I just take this off and it goes right here next to the countertop. And then it's just this one piece that you lift up, move over, tighten back down, and this thing is nice and secure against the countertop. Underneath the passenger seat here is a diesel heater. It taps into the actual diesel fuel tank of the vehicle and it just sips on it. It doesn't use a lot of fuel, doesn't use a lot of electricity. If you're going to be full-time or you're going to be doing winter van life, highly recommend a heater. I have loved having it. I've definitely needed it. This is the Dometic CRX 110 refrigerator. It has a little freezer compartment up here as well. It's definitely big enough for one person. I even think it's big enough for two. And I can fit about a week's worth of groceries in here, if not more. Over on this side of the van, we'll start up top. So this is my electrical cabinet. It has things like my water pressure, my Starlink under cabinet lights here, overhead lights, inverter, dial for my hot water heater. I love having all the electrical in this cabinet for aesthetic purposes. It's nice to just all be in there rather than out on the walls. So there's all my electrical right there. And then this is one of two food cabinets. I need to go to the grocery store. It's kind of empty. And then down here is the faucet, which has really good pressure, but I only turn it on a little bit to save water. It has a sprayer here. And then this is a soap dispenser. This is the Akiva Aeromax 2.0 water filtration system. It's mounted and plugged in under the sink. And then these plants are all real. Every plant that you see in here are real plants. It took me quite a while to figure out how to keep them alive and figure out which ones would actually be able to take the environment of the van. Underneath the sink is a five gallon gray water holding tank. It has a siren for when it's full, which I learned the hard way because you're doing dishes and listening to music and all of a sudden there's water everywhere. So that happened to me twice before I got this siren. I have my trash barrel under here. I have dish towels here. This is, I fill this with the filtered water so that I don't have to keep turning that faucet on all the time. I have my paper towels mounted here, a couple extras in the back behind the trash. And this is my other vacuum that I use for doing the floors. We'll go through these drawers so you can see how I organize things. So in here, I have all my kitchen utensils, knives, scissors, stuff like that, everything for cooking. And then this one here is for cups, water bottles. I have some paper plates. I have four glass Tupperware containers here with lids, Ziploc bags, bowls, one bigger mixing bowl, and some real plates down below, which I don't use super often just for dish sake. I usually use paper plates here. And then this one down below is all my electrical stuff. So computer, cameras, tripods, charging cords, speaker, stuff like that. Moving over to this side of the van, this shelf was actually installed after the buildout. So it's just for decor and plants and to put things from places that I traveled. I love it. I think it makes the van really nice and cozy and homey. Over here is the induction cooktop. I love the placement of it. It has really good ventilation and I love cooking with the view that I have out the sliding door. This cabinet up here is my other food cabinet. So I have two food cabinets. This one I store bread and quinoa. I have electrolyte packets, tea, coffee, and all my extra supplements up here. We'll make our way down here so you can see this cabinet. This is where I store most of my cooking stuff. So in the back there, you can see an air fryer. This is a coffee maker, hot water kettle there. And then these are green pans. I got them from REI. They have a removable handle, which is really nice. It just makes it much easier to store. Cutting board over there. And then this is Koa's food. I have his big bags in the back and I refill this whenever it's empty. And then I have his supplements up there. You already saw this cabinet and I'm going to run you through these four drawers really quick just to show you what I have organized in here. These are my supplements, incense, plant food, some bags. In here are my daily toiletries. So deodorant, airbrush, lotions, contacts, things of that nature. Underneath here is some more toiletries, shampoo, conditioner, soap, lotions, toilet paper, makeup, things of that nature. And underneath here are all my cleaning supplies and laundry supplies. This is the little trap door that goes to the garage. And on the side, I have all of my daily, weekly shoes that I use all the time. In the middle, I have my laundry. And on the right side, this is some nicer shoes and jewelry in case I want to dress up. The white box, I'm not going to bore you with. It's a bunch of extra stuff. Things like a hatchet, paw cream for Koa in case he hurts his paws, extra cleaning supplies, stuff like that. Overview of the toilet shower situation in here. So this is a Laveo dry flush toilet. It works based off of cartridges. It doesn't use any water. So what you do is you go to the bathroom and then you click this flush button and the waste gets wrapped up and then vacuum sealed down to the bottom. So there is absolutely no odor. This thing is almost full right now and I'm down here and I can't smell anything. So you can flush 15 times before you have to change the cartridge and then you just throw it away, put a new cartridge in and that's it. You're ready to go. Here's the shower. It's nice and roomy, at least for me. The walls are made of some sort of plastic vinyl, it seems like. And then this is a shower door that goes to the other side. I have a little bin right here to put my soaps. I do use all biodegradable soap because the shower actually drains right through to the ground. So it's filtered water, biodegradable soap. It's the same thing as taking an outdoor shower. I will say though, if I were to do it again, I would have a gray water tank because it's just a little bit more stealthy. So I would rather empty a gray water tank than have to think about where I am if somebody thinks that I'm doing something that I shouldn't be with the water going in the ground, even though it's just water and biodegradable soap. So it is okay. I shower every single day. It's just my thing. Everybody has their thing that they need to do daily to stay grounded and whatnot. And for me, it's my shower. I take quick showers, but I do shower every day, which is awesome. It just makes van life sustainable for me. I would not be able to do van life without a shower. For those of you who are out there showering every couple of days, bless your souls. I just, I couldn't do it. So that is my non-van life thing that I do, is that I shower every day. So in the back of the van is an almost queen size bed. It's not quite as long as a queen, but it is the width of a queen. Up here is where I keep all my clothes. I'll give you a little detailed view of that. Here's a shot of these upper cabinets. So on the left one, I have sports bras, socks, underwear, and the window cover for this window stays right there so I have easy access to it. In the middle here, I have t-shirts on the left, crop tops in the middle, and tank tops on the right. And then over here, I have leggings on the left, hiking pants on the bottom, sweatpants on the top, and shorts on the right. So those are all my clothes in those cabinets right there. Okay, that's it for the van tour. And obviously, this is my very first YouTube video. So all of you that are here, thank you so much for subscribing, liking, commenting. It really helps me out. I am brand new to this. I have never done any sort of filming and editing before the last couple months that I've been posting on Instagram and TikTok. If you're not over there, I linked all of those down below. We have some exciting things coming up in the next couple months. I am going to be answering tons of questions that I'm getting, and I'm excited to answer some of those in long form as well as short form. For those of you who are interested in more of the detail, I'm really excited to do that here. And then I have a little bit of a route planned out here for the next couple months, and I think it's going to be really fun. So I'm excited that you guys are here. Thank you so much for joining me. Thank you for the support, and we'll see you next week.