How can I be a good van-life climber?

Hey climbing (hopefully) friends, 

Here in the forums I've recently come across some negative comments about 'van-lifers', and it got me concerned. 

Question: What are some things I should think about in order to be a good climber citizen and make friends on my van travels?

Background: My kids are grown, I am newly single, and have a remote Internet job. I want to van-camp out in national land, climb and mountain bike more, and chill.

I own a van, not for living in, but for weekend and longer trips. I own a house and spend most of my time there. I have never encountered hate while using my van in real life, only here on MP. Hope this helps clarify. Nobody, and I mean nobody, has ever said anything or acted negatively towards me in the last 5 years because I am driving and camping out of my van.

Ditto what Cory said. But if you are worried about being a "good climber citizen", volunteer wherever you visit. Do trail work, pull invasive thistle, replace bad bolts, pick up trash when you see it. Do that and you are doing a lot more than most climbers, #vanlifers or otherwise. The fact that you are even asking this question is a good sign that you are already a good citizen!

I lived in a van full time for a year. Stay the fuck out of cities. You can make it work if you have to and there's a lot of skills you can learn to help adapt to city van life, but I was working full time as an airplane mechanic so I couldn't exactly fuck off to the woods. I dealt with a lot of shit and prejudice. People in cities are very over van lifers and regardless of your behavior they are over you. They not only call the cops on you, they accuse you of doing awful/disgusting/degrading shit so the cops have to waste their time "investigating" you. But they're home owners so they never get in trouble for wasting police resources on made up shit. 

Cops are useless as well. They'll tell you to move on from the good spots and try to send you to spots where you can't get sleep or often spots where you can't even legally park which is bat shit insane. 

My van was also shot by a pellet rifle in a suburban neighborhood at night while I was sleeping one time. 

This is all in San Jose, CA as well which I have heard many van lifers say is city dwelling on easy mode (makes sense, San Jose isn't really a city) Just stay the fuck out of cities and have a good time. 

I've had quite a few friends with vans, so I know not everyone in a van is inconsiderate. I think the issue is that vanlifers will often coalesce with each other to effectively blockade parking areas at desirable spots with a bright white wall. In the Church Bowl example, most of them aren't even climbing nearby, but just using it as a park-n-ride or a hacky-sack field. They could just as easily park at a non-climbing day-use area parking lot for that purpose and nobody would complain. The other issue is that some are not even trying to be low-key about illegally camping, and that concerns people who don't want even further regulations to be enacted. Similar issues would exist for sedans or RV's too, but it sure seems to be mostly vans lately. And a minor complaint might be the color... there's effectively a full fleet of tall, blinding white vans at any given climbing area in season. It kind of mars the visual aesthetic of an area the same way an RV generator disturbs the aural peace of an area. It would be nice if more were neutral colors but I understand that's not always an option. You sound like a considerate, thoughtful person, so I doubt you'll be part of the problem. 

Theres a lot of jealousy out there.  been vacationing in Vans for 27 years but we never hang in cities. if we do have to crash near a city we hit wallmart.  The rest of the time  we are in national forest  or  state trail heads.  only had a very few problems. only hasseled by cops twice. Pretty good at finding places to crash that are either legal or remote enough that no one cares.  but yes we stay out of town. 

Ricky Harlinewrote:

I lived in a van full time for a year. Stay the fuck out of cities. You can make it work if you have to and there's a lot of skills you can learn to help adapt to city van life, but I was working full time as an airplane mechanic so I couldn't exactly fuck off to the woods. I dealt with a lot of shit and prejudice. People in cities are very over van lifers and regardless of your behavior they are over you. They not only call the cops on you, they accuse you of doing awful/disgusting/degrading shit so the cops have to waste their time "investigating" you. But they're home owners so they never get in trouble for wasting police resources on made up shit. 

Cops are useless as well. They'll tell you to move on from the good spots and try to send you to spots where you can't get sleep or often spots where you can't even legally park which is bat shit insane. 

My van was also shot by a pellet rifle in a suburban neighborhood at night while I was sleeping one time. 

This is all in San Jose, CA as well which I have heard many van lifers say is city dwelling on easy mode (makes sense, San Jose isn't really a city) Just stay the fuck out of cities and have a good time. 

The problem is that a lot of van people do create issues when camping in the city. For example, we live across the street from a park, and occasionally van and RV people post up for the night. It is not uncommon for them to release their dogs into the park while they do their van things in their vans. Of course, they never pick up after their dogs, and often these dogs become aggressive with neighborhood dogs who are on a leash. We’ve seen trash left behind, and once even a dude left his van and took a dump in the middle of the park, in plain view of everyone.

Frank Steinwrote:

The problem is that a lot of van people do create issues when camping in the city. For example, we live across the street from a park, and occasionally van and RV people post up for the night. It is not uncommon for them to release their dogs into the park while they do their van things in their vans. Of course, they never pick up after their dogs, and often these dogs become aggressive with neighborhood dogs who are on a leash. We’ve seen trash left behind, and once even a dude left his van and took a dump in the middle of the park, in plain view of everyone.

Yeah I get where the people are coming from, but it was the only time I as a white dude have really faced prejudice of any sort and it turns out it's not exactly a good time fun party. It's just frustrating when I was working full time, being extra considerate, and still constantly viewed and treated as an unwelcome parasite in society. 

This comment is slightly van-life related, only because van's are larger vehicles. Learn to park so not take up multiple spaces. The more general comment is for everyone to learn to park so to maximize the number of vehicles that can park in an area. 

A couple of winters ago the person driving a van decided to parallel park in an area that was perpendicular parking. They basically took three spaces. People were none too please given there are normally about a dozen spaces total. The result people parked on both sides blocking the van in. 

Don’t post up for months and take over a popular campground and climber parking lot thereby preventing those living the non-dirtbag life from camping/climbing. 

The van lifers also really messed things up for everybody down in Joshua Tree by throwing big illegal parties in the Outback.  

https://www.mountainproject.com/forum/topic/124728710/jtree-hobbit-hole-bonfires-rangers-seeking-information

As far as being considerate to non van people, just ask yourself: "Am I prohibiting someone else from using this resource that I don't even need"? For example, if you're sleeping, cooking, etc. in your van, do you really need to be parked in one of the few good spots for a tent, when there are other spots that would easily work for you? I think a lot of van dwellers (or people in general) want to be considerate, but don't always think of some of the less obvious ways in which they affect others' experience. 

sounds like a lot of folks go out of their way to find reasons to be offended by vans.  welcome to Merika. the land of the free where you are allowed to spend 120k on a van but god forbid you try and park somewhere to take a nap. Some fucking karen on the internet is going to accuse you of occupying a tent  site.  

I know some of you kids don't get it. Buy a house, live in it, take care of it, make payments for a decade or so, get to know your neighbors.

Then, have some wannabe dirtbag of a homeless person post up their perv van every night in front of your house. The one you paid for. See how you like it.

We (the property owners) don't want you camping in our streets. Its really that simple.

Ricky Harlinewrote:

I lived in a van full time for a year. Stay the fuck out of cities. You can make it work if you have to and there's a lot of skills you can learn to help adapt to city van life, but I was working full time as an airplane mechanic so I couldn't exactly fuck off to the woods. I dealt with a lot of shit and prejudice. People in cities are very over van lifers and regardless of your behavior they are over you. They not only call the cops on you, they accuse you of doing awful/disgusting/degrading shit so the cops have to waste their time "investigating" you. But they're home owners so they never get in trouble for wasting police resources on made up shit. 

Cops are useless as well. They'll tell you to move on from the good spots and try to send you to spots where you can't get sleep or often spots where you can't even legally park which is bat shit insane. 

My van was also shot by a pellet rifle in a suburban neighborhood at night while I was sleeping one time. 

This is all in San Jose, CA as well which I have heard many van lifers say is city dwelling on easy mode (makes sense, San Jose isn't really a city) Just stay the fuck out of cities and have a good time. 

If you don't mind sharing specifics, where in San Jose were you camping/this stuff was happening? I'm just curious because I've lived there my whole life until the last year or so.

Nick Goldsmithwrote:

sounds like a lot of folks go out of their way to find reasons to be offended by vans.  welcome to Merika. the land of the free where you are allowed to spend 120k on a van but god forbid you try and park somewhere to take a nap. Some fucking karen on the internet is going to accuse you of occupying a tent  site.  

You're right, I'm going to start parking diagonally at parking lots, blast my music, buzz you with my drone, and overall just be an inconsiderate ass because of... freedom. LOL

I’ve had my trigger points around “van life.” Probably a lot of it is jealousy, the part of me that wishes I could base my life around recreation while somewhat mysteriously being able to afford a $120k platform upon which to do so.

To have a luxury status symbol along with the free time to use it? I mean, holy shit, who isn’t gonna go a little green?

It’s like mid-week tech bros nonchalantly telling you they’re going to knock down some classic pitches and do a couple hours of work in the parking lot near wi-fi before heading back to Santa Rosa. It must be nice to make ends meet with such minimal effort. They have no idea how many people I have to disappoint just to manage the lifestyle of a mediocre shitty car driving day tripper climbing punter.

I guess I should have been born smarter or to wealthier people. Once again, my bad.

I have friends with the vans, the more fluid situations. As opposed to these people I’ve somehow deemed cool, I guess what would typify the sort that is a “bad” van lifer are people who act like they’re now local everywhere but they only seem interested in interacting with people like themselves. If they acknowledge they can actually see you, it’s with a pained grin.

To cut this literary dookie short, I’d advise the OP not to bother trying to appease others with your lifestyle. I’m going to hate you already just because you’re trying to get on the same climb.

Stay away from my preferred bivy spots, and everything will be just fine.

Milan Damjanacwrote:

If you don't mind sharing specifics, where in San Jose were you camping/this stuff was happening? I'm just curious because I've lived there my whole life until the last year or so.

All over. I worked in east San Jose so I spent a lot of time there to be close to work, I climbed downtown and so spent much time camped there, I had family in South San Jose so spent time there. Found willow Glenn and West San Jose to have lots of quiet neighborhoods that were easy to camp in and so spend a lot of time there. Basically I spent the night all over the city except for the more northern parts. 

Cities can be great, sorry you had those experiences Ricky. I have been harassed by neighbors and cops. They will plaster scary notices on your windshield with glue that stays stuck for months, knock on your window at 2 am then 4 am then 6am to let you know you are not breaking any laws and allowed to be there, and paint your tires with chalk. One cop even shook my van vigorously while I was watching from inside the house it was parked in front of by pushing it back and forth on the side, if there was a glass out or anything like that I would have come home to quite the mess... Not really sure what he was trying to achieve. One time a guy that I think was on some sort of drug or in psychosis came right into my van and declared that it was his and after I kicked him out he proceeded to lick the windows of my friend's Subaru who was staying with me that night. 

Anyways what was I saying? Oh yeah cities can be great just pick the right one or the right spots. Even if you're like me and don't have a 120k van which are in my estimation seldomly harassed. 

Cherokee Nuneswrote:

I know some of you kids don't get it. Buy a house, live in it, take care of it, make payments for a decade or so, get to know your neighbors.

Then, have some wannabe dirtbag of a homeless person post up their perv van every night in front of your house. The one you paid for. See how you like it.

We (the property owners) don't want you camping in our streets. Its really that simple.

lol

buy a burrito for the dirtbag parked next to you in the fucked up hatchback