A week ago today, I was in Michigan picking up a 1969 VW Bus.
On Wed (Oct 11th), Naya (daughter) and I flew from Austin, stopped in Chicago to visit the Shedd aquarium, and then headed to Kalamazoo.
I picked up the U-haul trailer the next morning (Thursday, Oct 12th), drove 45 minutes north of Kalamazoo to a farm in Middleville. This wasn’t just a pick up and go. Jack Churchill and I and a good hour and half conversation about the history of the bus, what to look out for when renovating these vintage buses, and then putting the bus on the auto trailer.
Come to find out, this bus went up to the UP twice a year in the 80s (and 90s). with the Churchill family. It has two cots / hammocks in it, which is something that I haven’t seen in the other buses we have or that I have looked. Each bus is unique in its own way (just like our gelato flavors :-).
Below are pictures from the picking up the bus, and bringing it back to the garage to be with the original RG VW Bus, a 1976 VW Bus.
As you will see from the pictures of this VW Bus compared to the 1976 VW Bus we go to market with currently, we spend time cleaning out and fixing up the inside and outside of the bus, as well as the engine and the brake system. A fun project, that will take some time.
While in Michigan, we also picked up Widad and started driving south to Texas last Saturday evening in the rain. Now we are in Austin working on starting the market in the “live music capital”. And the Kalamazoo market will be a monthly market over the next 5 months, where Widad will fly to Kalamazoo once a month to make the gelato / sorbet on demand.