Ive left an 82 westy in storage in Abbotsford for the last few years - I fly from Ontario to Vancouver 2 or 3 times per year and travel around bc. I've been planning on shipping my 78 to Europe for the last few years - it's in 8 out of 10 condition so after a few trips selling it there would be profitable. Sent from my iPhone > On Jul 18, 2015, at 10:13 AM, mark drillock <mdrillock@COX.NET> wrote: > > We shipped our Westy over and camped in 10 countries. We covered about > 6,000 miles in 2 months, mostly on secondary roads and smaller. We > stayed at public and private campgrounds and often took trains or buses > from them into the cities for tourist activities. The camping was easy > and the people were friendly. Our Calif plates stood out and people > gawked at them everywhere we went, at times like we were in a UFO. I > can't tell you how many times someone saw the front plate and then went > to the back to see if it matched, then scratching their heads. The only > other vehicle we saw with US plates was an aircooled Westy, with > European plates in the normal spots but a couple of old US plates > screwed onto the back hatch. In the last weeks of our trip we started > using more high speed roads to cover ground quickly. We probably should > have done some of that earlier but I wanted to see more real towns and > not just ones on the major routes. We tried not to drive at all in the > streets of bigger cities but it happened sometimes. > > Depending on where we were there were few if any other T3 models on the > road but in some places in Germany they were a common sight. Lots of > camper variations and with as many truck versions as vans, often in > commercial use. In Italy we were approached daily by people wanting to > buy ours and this happened in other countries too. Our van is not > perfect but it looks better than most of the other T3 campers we saw. > Newer VW camper vans were everywhere at the campgrounds and I stopped at > a VW dealer to have a quick look at a T6 Westy poptop model. > > We had no mechanical issues of any kind. I added air to the tires and > oil to the engine. We used 1/2 quart every 2000 miles. Coolant level > stayed steady. I believe the 87 Westy has the original engine since that > is what the PO told me and the engine serial number is correct for the > vehicle manufacturing date. The heads are not original though. > > We left the van there in storage so we could return and do it some more. > There is a lot left to see and unusual heat kept us from seeing some > places we had planned on. I'll be taking a 3 window canvas to install > next time so heat won't matter as much. > > > Mark |
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