My three biggest worries about living in a van, are about something happening to the van - being in a crash bad enough to write it off, something mechanical catestrophically shitting its self like the gearbox exploding or something, or the van being stolen/broken into or seriously vandalised. My van isn't just "my van" in the sense of it being my mode of transport - it's my means of travel, it's how I earn money, and it's where I literally live. My whole life sits on these four tyres, and if any of the above three scenarios should ever happen, I'd be, for lack of a better term, fucked. Absolutely, utterly, fucked.
The latter of the three points is something I used to be particularly paranoid about, to the point where I didn't like leaving it out of sight when taking Sanchez out for a walk etc, and would check over my shoulder, or double back doubting myself whether I'd locked the doors or not, and I wouldn't go too far or for too long. This passed over time, mostly, I mean I'm still conscious about where I leave the van and tend to think about who else is around and the type of area I'm in, but for the most part I sort of stopped worrying about it so much and just got on with it. Vehicle crime happens, it happens and worrying about it isn't going to make it any less likely to happen, so beyond parking up sensibly, locking up securely and keeping everything of any sort of value out of sight, that's really all I can do, it's out of my hands, no sense living in a state of paranoia.
Lockdown has been tense for van dwellers, both in terms of increased scrutiny from the police regarding our reason for travel and whereabouts, and village locals taking it upon themselves to act as vigilante parking wardens, with many vanlifers reporting hostile behaviour - some people have had their vans vandalised and damaged simply for being there, as some sort "go home" message, overlooking the fact that we are home! So it's been a bit of a weird time, and yet again I've found myself looking back over my shoulder when walking off from the van, and peering out of my peephole when cars pull into wherever I am.
I've been lucky, I've never had much "bother" from anyone in the year I've lived in my own van - I'm yet to have a middle of the night knock from the police, I've only had to leave a spot once due to knobheads giving me hastle / throwing bottles at my van (in fact even then I chose to leave, after seeing them off first with an axe, but figured they might come back for another round), and I've only had one totalitarian gobshite directly verbally confront me, and I sent her off with her tail inbetween her legs too. Sure, I get stigmatized and tutted at here and there - some people just don't like "travellers" or people that live in vehicles, and that's fine, that's their prerogative and I let them get on with it, again it's notably increased during lockdown, but I haven't gone out of my way to hide away any more than I have to draw attention to myself. My van is quite stealthy, apart from the wooden window frame on the side and chimney poking out of the top, but parked side-on it passes for a trademans workhorse, so I think I get away with hiding in plain sight a lot - plus I'm pretty good at picking my spots and looking out for the clues as to who I might see at night - I wrote about this in one of my first blogs, The Art of Boondocking, and trust my gut feeling when pulling up to a parkup.
Last week however I'd parked up by a reservoir just outside of Leeds, nice spot but a bit close to some big towns - I know from experience that secluded spots close to big towns get a bit of a night time gathering, especially on weekends - you know how it is, young lads in cars smoking a bit of weed etc. They don't typically bother me, I don't typically bother them - I like to make my presence known on arrival; get out take Sanchez for a little sniff around, make eye contact, and leave them be with the expectation that it's mutual, and I'll just keep a distant eye on them until they've gone, but I don't make a habit of parking up in these kind of spots on weekends.
On the second morning, I woke up to the influx of joggers, cyclists and dog walkers turning up, everyone parked at a sensible distance. Apart from one car. I heard it pull up, right behind my van, bit of a throaty exhaust and the engine left running. Sanchez is really good at alerting me to the proximity of people around the van, he had his ears up, listening out. After a few minutes, I heard two sets of car doors open and close, engine still running. This got my attention, and I heard two voices, first one "I dunno man there's a lot of people around!", second voice replied "fuck 'em mate, what they gonna do? We'll be quick anyway". I jumped out of bed in a scramble to pull some clothes on, at about the same time I could hear footsteps going down the drivers side of my van - Sanchez picked up on them being way too close and started barking loudly, and the first voice shouted "Shit there's someone in there!" followed by the sound of them running back to their car, doors slamming and the car speeding off - I only caught a quick glimpse of the car, a blue Mazda RX8, at speed.
I still have no idea what they were intending, but they were intending something for sure - I have absolutely no doubt that if I'd have been out of bed earlier and walking Sanchez, I'd have returned to find my van vandalised, broken into, or not there at all. It didn't bother me at the timez I was just glad I'd had a lazy morning, but I've found myself thinking about it a lot since - back to double checking the doors and looking over my shoulder when I leave the van. It'll pass.
Stay safe out there, be careful, but more importantly, be sensible - if something doesn't seem right, it's usually for good reason. Trust your instincts. ✌️
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