Memory Lane: The Camper

For the past several months I've spotted a 1970s olive green VW camper van puttering around our area. It was parked in front a house at the end of our street the first time I saw it and several people were standing around it, gesturing and talking in an animated fashion. If I hadn't been in a hurry to get somewhere I would have been tempted to stop and ask if I could peek inside. The tell-tale green and brown plaid curtains over the windows stirred up some memories in the recesses of my childhood brain.

Since then I've seen it at least three more times, always out of the corner of my eye: passing me on the opposite side of the road, turning into the parking lot of a local veterinarian, disappearing around the corner as I glanced up to see where that familiar sound was coming from.

I know it's the same van because come on, how often do you see an olive green VW camper van from the 1970s in mint condition tooling around town?

In the late 1970s, we acquired such a van. But prior to the green one there was an orange one. When I say orange, I mean ORANGE. This was the car of my early childhood, the car we drove cross-country in when my dad, an aspiring oceanographer fresh out of graduate school, got a job in Oregon for the summer where he spent his days flying low over the Pacific ocean in a prop plane to obtain water samples. He, my mom, our little dog Toto and I loaded up the orange camper van and drove through such states as Oklahoma and Colorado en route to our desination. Along the way we camped in the desert, fed chipmunks on the side of a rocky mountain, stepped on a snowy mountaintop in the middle of June. The orange van broke down a few times along the way. On the way home we stopped in Texas and ended up picking up a stray dog that someone had dumped along the side of the road. Lulu joined our little family in the orange camper van as we made our way back to Florida.

Me, my Dad and Toto on our way to Oregon inside the van in 1973

Camping in the desert in 1973

I don't remember too much about that original van except the color and the vague memories of times spent in it. The olive green camper van was the van of our childhood. I remember as a kid I was so excited to have such a car - with the built-in sink, tiny refrigerator, the pop-up top that folded out into a bed. As I grew older the novelty wore off. I found myself wishing we could be like other families and just have a station wagon. In the late 70s and early 80s, the station wagon was like the minivan of today. Everyone had one, except us. As a pre-teen I remember being slightly embarrassed when I'd hear the tell-tale puttering of the van pulling into the carpool line at school, that green color sticking out like a sore thumb. One time my sister was waiting for my mom to pick her up and a boy yelled "Hey, Vanessa, here comes your green booger!" as the van pulled into view.

Today all my childhood friends remember that van with great fondness, as do I. But at the time I yearned for wood paneling and a rear-facing jump seat. We always want what we don't have.

When I was a kid the van was always breaking down. Orange or green, I can't recall. There was a time that when the van stalled, the only way to get it going again was to go to the back where the engine was, cross some wires to kick-start it as someone else pressed the gas, and then run like mad to jump in so that it wouldn't stall out again. I remember this taking place on the side of the highway, my dad performing the delicate task of starting the engine and my mom sitting high up in the driver's seat revving the gas. I remember feeling slightly terrified as my dad leaped into the car that was already moving forward. "Little Miss Sunshine" had nothing on us.

The back seat of the camper van was set far back from the driver and front passenger seats. I understand now why that was so important, having gone through the baby and toddler years with my kids sitting directly behind me. Despite the buffer zone we still got yelled at sometimes by our exasperated parents when our decibel level rose too high. Without the modern addition of built-in DVD players we had to entertain ourselves as we rode along on our bench seat, secured by flimsy lap belts (or nothing at all as we sometimes secretly unbuckled ourselves on long car rides). On a particularly long ride to Vermont one year for a week-long ski trip, the heat in the van broke down and we suffered under piles of comforters as our breath fogged up the windows.

In the late 1980s my parents gave up the green van and upgraded to the newer, fancier VW Vanagon. This model was wider, sleeker and a brushed gold color - something normal! The Vanagon gained the reputation as the party van, as my parents would park it up at Suzy-Q (Ukrainian resort in the Catskills that we frequented on long summer weekends) so that my sister and I and our friends could crash there after dancing the night away. The Vanagon was also the ultimate road trip vehicle as evidenced by the number of times my parents would ferry us and our friends to various camps and out-of-town functions. One of my mom's favorite stories is the time we pulled up to a toll booth en route to a Ukrainian dance in Ohio and my friends and I were belting out the lyrics to the Dirty Dancing soundtrack at the top of our lungs.

On our way to ski camp in 1984 in the Vanagon

On my wedding day in 1998 my parents told us that they would pick us up in a fancy ride to take us down to the church. As John and I waited patiently to be whisked away in style, we started laughing hysterically as we saw the Vanagon toodling up the driveway, adorned in white lacy bows, my proud parents smiling proudly in the front seat. After the wedding we climbed back inside and enjoyed cold drinks from the cooler they had placed inside for us. It felt like coming home.

 

 

On a sad day not too long afterwards the Vanagon's new owner came and drove it away. Our era of owning Volkswagens was over. My parents' driveway really never looked the same again.

I think the next time I see that olive green VW camper van with the spare tire strapped on the front I'll try my best to track it down. Perhaps the owner will let me peek inside. I wish I could go back in time and tell my pre-teen self to forget those silly dreams of riding around in a wood-paneled station wagon. The memories of those campers are a lot more interesting.