Now I’m paraphrasing of course, but you get the idea, and we’ve just take our first step. And it’s a big one!

After a few hectic months where we’ve not been able to do anything with the van we carried out arguably one of the most important (and my least favourite) tasks of all – measuring up and cleaning the inside of the van.

As you can see the interior was pretty grubby, having been used as a working van and was full of dirt, dust, and rubble.

A full afternoon was spent sweeping and dusting, wiping down surfaces, and trying to get at the general grime.

Then we had to remove the battered wall panels, which are made of a thin sheet of fiberboard, revealing an absolute treasure trove of filth and grime.

A couple of hours later and it’s mostly gleaming. Some surfaces, such as the wheel arches, are scuffed and scratched from use and no amount of elbow grease will tidy them up. Luckily, these will be covered by the furniture and storage units so all they need to be is clear of dirt and grime.

Now you can actually see your face in the wall panels, almost a shame that they’ll eventually be covered in insulation and walls.

Our once grey walls are now a gleaming white.

Next step is to build a test electrical system so that we can see how and where all the devices and wiring will go and also check that it all works properly before we start wiring up a full setup, but more about that in our next post.