Welcome to the first series of Bus Life! As avid van life folk, we take the home-one-wheels approach pretty seriously when it comes to alternative living. So, to kick start our Bus life series, meet three couples who are stepping up the home-on-wheels game, taking Van-life to the next level.
Who are the Outback osteos? Tell us a little about you and your bus crew.
We're Chris and Mandy, two travelling Osteopaths with a strong sense of adventure and a desire to push ourselves and the boundaries of a career within Osteopathy. We believe all Australians deserve adequate access to healthcare and we’ve made it our mission to provide hands on healthcare, education and mental health counselling to as many people as we can from all walks of life all over this country. For the last 18 months we’ve been taking our skills, knowledge and passion to the most remote communities in Australia and we have absolutely loved every second of it. Earlier this year we swapped our humble Hyundai iLoad Van “Walter” to an old Toyota Coaster Bus that we’ve named “Bussell Coight”.
And how did you end up living in a bus?
In our first loop of NT and WA we became aware of the massive need for our services in rural and remote areas. We wanted to be able to move to these towns for larger blocks of time while still being really comfortable in our own space. Ralphy was getting too big for our first little home on wheels as well so we wanted to give him a bit more space, naturally the bus was the logical solution. We always dreamed of owning one and the timing just felt right.
What's your favourite part of Bus Life?
Having all your belongings with you all the time, meeting so many cool people on the road, seeing the sunset in a new spot most nights, being together constantly and creating a lifestyle that we’ve always dreamt of. It really is like having an apartment where you can choose your view every night... It’s the bloody best.
Top 5 Tips for Bus life:
1. Download Wiki camps – it’s our bible
2. Make playlists for every mood
3. Celebrate the little things
4. Watch the sunset
5. Appreciate the beauty of the world around us!
Tell us a little about you and your bus crew?
We are Ash and Hayden, two Aussies travelling around Australia in our self-converted home on wheels named Kunu! A few years ago we decided to ditch our full time jobs and start a new life on the road and we haven't looked back since.
How did you end up living in a bus?
Hayden and I both owned vans when we first met and would always be going away on little weekend adventures, about a year into our relationship we decided that it was time to upgrade to a larger vehicle. That's when we came across Kunu on Facebook, we took one look and knew that it was the perfect bus for what we had planned. We both loved the idea of travelling Australia and buying a bus instead of a house gave us the opportunity to explore more of this amazing country we live in.
What's your favourite part of Bus Life?
The best part for us is being able to take our home with us wherever we go, it's so handy pulling up to a campsite and having basically everything setup already. It definitely takes the hassle out of having to setup tents etc. Also being able to wake up in beautiful locations all around Australia is a definite highlight.
Top 5 Tips for Bus life:
1.Make sure you do some research and try to find the perfect bus to fit your needs.
2. Test out the space as you build to learn what's working and what's not before you set off on your big lap, there's nothing worse than having to make changes later down the track.
3. Regular maintenance and servicing to make sure your bus is running to the best of its ability.
4. Think about the space and how it will work not only now but also with your future plans.
5. Enjoy the process even though it may be frustrating at times.
Tell us a bit about Salty the Bus and the crew onboard!
We're Madie and Mark and we’re from the Central Coast, NSW. We’ve been travelling around Aus in our Toyota coaster bus named Salty. We bought him as a school bus a couple of years ago and turned him into our dream home on wheels! We love travelling and are ocean lovers so we thought living in a bus moving along the coastline would be an absolute dream!
And what brought you to living life in a bus?
We knew one day we’d love to explore our own country slowly and properly so we thought what better way to do that than on a road trip? We then checked out some vehicles like vans or 4wds but ended up falling in love with the coaster bus as we knew we’d be more than comfortable in a nice big space. It also meant that we could build everything that a normal house has, just mini!!
What's your favourite part of Bus Life?
There’s so many. We love that the bus has taken us to sooo many beautiful places we didn’t think could exist, I’ll never forget driving towards the centre of Australia and seeing magical Uluru for the first time. We love pulling up at the water and jumping straight out for a surf, swim, fish or a dive, catching our own dinner and heading into the bus to cook it all up! We’ve parked at some pretty amazing locations, we thank ourselves everyday for making this happen.
Top 5 Tips for Bus life:
1. Eat cheaply
2. Don’t buy white bedding
3. Don’t plan ahead too much, it's way better going with the flow as you'll probably end up parked up at an amazing beach camp and you won't wanna leave for weeks
4. You can never have too much solar power
5. Practice cooking your food on a hard lean as you’ll probably never be parked completely flat, the amount of onions and carrots that catapult off the bench while we’re chopping is in the hundreds lol.
