There is a certain romance about buying a bus, chucking all your gear in the back and driving off into the sunset for a carefree week or two on the south coast of France,  deck chair by the van, BBQ on the go with a glass of vino or a beer in your hand..

Unfortunately before you arrive thats all it is, romance!

Sure when you get there you’ll be sitting with the sun on your facing muttering to yourself life doesn’t get much better than this, but nagging away in the back of your mind will be the wonder, the wonder that will all the things you’ve spent the winter fixing hold out for the journey home?

You see, buying an old bus is like making a deal with the devil, the only difference being instead of signing over your soul to the devil you sign over your wallet and time to the bus.

Bumblebee rolled out of the factory in 1999 and since then has covered roughly 270,000 miles, yep, you read that right. Most people wouldn’t touch a vehicle with that kind of mileage with a barge pole but, the combination of a good service history, German engineering and a good workhorse diesel engine means this baby should be good for a million miles, in theory!

Things will however go wrong, as i’ve already mentioned, rust, common on old vehicles and something Bumblebee came with a considerable amount of, he also came with a few more issues the previous owner failed to mention…

I would never have been able to get on with any of the repairs without the knowledge and wisdom of the users of the VWT4 forum, a fantastically friendly bunch and a well kept searchable forum that has the answers to almost all T4 technical issues as well as conversion threads, stolen vehicle watch and a trading post.  Thank you to all for answering my many questions with suggestions and solutions!