Travel

Hippie Road Trip

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On what must be the busiest travel weekend of the year, I was tickled by this L.A. Times article about two Brazilians on a modern day hippie road trip across Latin America in a VW Bus.

The car is unsafe by today’s standards, of course. But what it lacks in functioning crumple zones it makes up for with it’s approachability factor. It’s a much better head-turning and friend-making car than, say, a Camry. But then the ability to get strangers to smile isn’t usually designed into modern cars, and Volkswagen has announced it’s discontinuing production of the microbus at the end of this year.

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Thus we all will receive, for Christmas, a succession of news articles featuring people telling us their VW Bus stories.

Here’s one about a couple that has made a business out of giving people tours of San Francisco in a VW Bus. San Francisco is always interesting, but it seems this business is built mostly on the feeling people get around the car, especially in that historic hippie setting.

It doesn’t take long to find more – a 22 year old North Carolinian who has been dreaming of owning a VW Camper since he was 14, and a Brit renting one for a family holiday in the UK.

And of course I know there are fond VW bus memories on the Trail from Crow Girl and tim, which I would love to hear more about.

No doubt once production ceases (or even before), there will be calls to bring back the bus!

What discontinued product would you like to bring back?

100 thoughts on “Hippie Road Trip”

      1. Magic Shell is a chocolate syrup that hardens to a shell when you cool it down (as in pouring it over ice cream). Once you open the little bottle, you have to keep in the fridge so that to use it again, you have to heat it up. A little like fudge. About 20 years ago, Minneapolis/St. Paul was a test market for individual servings.. so you didn’t have to warm up the whole bottle for just one serving. They had a couple of kinds – I particularly liked the one w/ toffee bits in it. Alas, it must not have sold well enough, so it went away.

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        2. By the way, vs, I did a little more research on the Thanksgivukkah phenomenon. The last time Thanksgiving and Hanukkah converged was in 1888. The first day of Hanukkah in 1918 was November 29, a Friday. Apparently the convergence of those two holidays is extremely rare because of the Jewish calendar which adds a leap month (yes you read that right) every now and again. It’s rather complicated, to say the least. Here’s the background and history, for anyone who’s interested:

          The Jewish calendar is based on three astronomical phenomena: the rotation of the Earth about its axis (a day); the revolution of the moon about the Earth (a month); and the revolution of the Earth about the sun (a year). These three phenomena are independent of each other, so there is no direct correlation between them. On average, the moon revolves around the Earth in about 29½ days. The Earth revolves around the sun in about 365¼ days, that is, about 12.4 lunar months.

          The civil calendar used by most of the world has abandoned any correlation between the moon cycles and the month, arbitrarily setting the length of months to 28, 30 or 31 days.

          The Jewish calendar, however, coordinates all three of these astronomical phenomena. Months are either 29 or 30 days, corresponding to the 29½-day lunar cycle. Years are either 12 or 13 months, corresponding to the 12.4 month solar cycle.

          The lunar month on the Jewish calendar begins when the first sliver of moon becomes visible after the dark of the moon. In ancient times, the new months used to be determined by observation. When people observed the new moon, they would notify the Sanhedrin. When the Sanhedrin heard testimony from two independent, reliable eyewitnesses that the new moon occurred on a certain date, they would declare the rosh chodesh (first of the month) and send out messengers to tell people when the month began.

          The problem with strictly lunar calendars is that there are approximately 12.4 lunar months in every solar year, so a 12-month lunar calendar is about 11 days shorter than a solar year and a 13-month lunar is about 19 longer than a solar year. The months drift around the seasons on such a calendar: on a 12-month lunar calendar, the month of Nissan, which is supposed to occur in the Spring, would occur 11 days earlier in the season each year, eventually occurring in the Winter, the Fall, the Summer, and then the Spring again. On a 13-month lunar calendar, the same thing would happen in the other direction, and faster.

          To compensate for this drift, the Jewish calendar uses a 12-month lunar calendar with an extra month occasionally added. The month of Nissan occurs 11 days earlier each year for two or three years, and then jumps forward 30 days, balancing out the drift. In ancient times, this month was added by observation: the Sanhedrin observed the conditions of the weather, the crops and the livestock, and if these were not sufficiently advanced to be considered “spring,” then the Sanhedrin inserted an additional month into the calendar to make sure that Pesach (Passover) would occur in the spring (it is, after all, referred to in the Torah as Chag he-Aviv, the Festival of Spring!).

          A year with 13 months is referred to in Hebrew as Shanah Me’uberet (pronounced shah-NAH meh-oo-BEH-reht), literally: a pregnant year. In English, we commonly call it a leap year. The additional month is known as Adar I, Adar Rishon (first Adar) or Adar Alef (the Hebrew letter Alef being the numeral “1” in Hebrew). The extra month is inserted before the regular month of Adar (known in such years as Adar II, Adar Sheini or Adar Beit). Note that Adar II is the “real” Adar, the one in which Purim is celebrated, the one in which yahrzeits for Adar are observed, the one in which a 13-year-old born in Adar becomes a Bar Mitzvah. Adar I is the “extra” Adar.

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        3. It must have been difficult to keep track of the months when it was done by observing the moon. Perhaps you’d have heavy cloud cover for a couple of days about the time you expected the month to start. Would you have to wait till the cloud cover lifted before you could start your month?

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        4. thanks pj i love thr idea of following the moon who cares about the months? the moon you plant in the moon you harvest in. the spring and fall equinox. i ove following the moon . used to have a calendar on the fridge and on my computer calendar.

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        5. Can’t answer your question, Linda; I don’t know. I just thought it fascinating that in order to compute the convergence of these two holidays, you need a lot more than knowledge than just mathematics. You’d also have to know the intricacies of how the Jewish calendar is calculated.

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        6. PJ, thanks for the research. I was curious and had read a little bit but hadn’t found the thorough explanation you did. Thanks–

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  3. Good morning. The Fannie Farmer Cookbook from the 1960s. We wore out one of these and still make extensive use of a used one we bought to replace the one that fell apart. The most comprehensive common sense cookbook with almost any kind of basic information you need on cooking.

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    1. I knew this was around, seen it in newer containers, but to buy it in that tin, would be a memory, but I know its scent bothers me:

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      2. hee hee hee… I’ve probably still got a can of that down in the barn. I never used it much. Guess I don’t know what I was missing! But it would use ‘teat dilators’ (to keep the canal open if their teats had been stepped on or otherwise injured) and the dilators were packed in something very similar to bag balm.

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        1. Ah, yes, another very tactile memory. I have had to explain to people who use it as a hand cream that the name is not a joke.

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    2. We like the the completely revised edition from 1959 which was still available as a new paperback printing in the late 60s or early 70s. We have a copy of the 1997 revised edition and it is not as good as 1959 revision. The one you found, Clyde, is the latest revision, which I haven’t seen, and which I would guess it probably lacks some of the things I like about the 1959 revision. In 1997 they didn’t seem to have have all of the extensive information on cooking that is found in the revision we like.

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        1. jim. if you go on amazon and or half.com they have every book ever published just about and the cost is usually a dollar or two. freight is often more than the book and shipping tops out a 4 dollars.

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        3. I am aware that used copies of that book no doubt are available from Amazon. The down side of buying from Amazon is their bad labor practices at their distribution centers that I heard about from an investigator and some former employees.

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        4. Tim, that $30 one is more expensive than the 1959 revision that we like that is available for only a few bucks plus shipping.

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  5. How I spent Black Friday, thanks to fearless leader, looking up old nostrums: my father ate these my whole childhood to fight his ulcer, I could not watch him chew them. I wonder if they are still little chunks of charcoal that turn your mouth black.

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      1. i had forgotten these clyde. i had an umcer that began when i was about 12. (what kind of person has an ulcer develop when they are 12) and i had all sorts of little tricks i’d try. the anxiety caused by the intrusive diet cause as much anxiety as the life issues that must have been getting me anxious. i had a hard time with the milktoast diet that was the perscription at the time. today i carry arm and hammer with me as a staple. chemistry class in my pocket. acid that causes pain is more easily snuffed out for the moment than dealt with in a big picture fashion. if they ever do away with baking soda im in trouble but i guess i could afford a lifetime supply if they gave me a little notice. i buy it in 5 lb bags and clean the carpet with it too. 5 lbs for 7 bucks i think. enough to deal with my ulcer tenancies for about 10 years. the charcoal back in the old days was a fix for drinking too much, my guesss is your dad used it differently.

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  6. I guess only Jim, Sherrilee and I are not out in the crowds. I do have to go out today, into the mess to get a prescription that my wife needs later this morning.

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      1. I went out to Michaels at 7 (decided late last night to scrap my almost completed “family gift” as I just didn’t like how it was coming together) and stopped at Walgreens on the way home — pretty quiet in both places. That is all I’m willing to do on Black Friday. Maybe we’ll get the tree today. Maybe tomorrow.

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    2. There is no way I am out in the crowds, Clyde. Can’t think of much else worse than shopping on most days and that feeling is even stronger today. (Lately I have been feeling nostalgic about the days my dad would accomplish his Christmas shopping by walking down the hill – on December 24 – to the one and only department store in town, buying a few things, and coming back to wrap them in newspaper. No fuss, no frenzy.) I had trouble sleeping last night and thus got up late. Twin grandbabies (and their mom) stayed overnight, so will be spending time with them today, as well as eating leftover pie. And I will be back on the trail later when I’ve thought of an answer to the question.

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  7. I’m here, Clyde, but I might have little to say. Our family car for about eight years was a Volkswagen Kombi, which you can think of as a VW microbus but not as luxurious, a vehicle meant for toting products in Europe. It terrified me when I figured out how little protection it offered in a crash, but we didn’t have money to drive a safer vehicle in those days. The shipping clerk for my dad’s stuffed animal factory was driving the Kombi on winter roads when a stiff shot of wind blew him into the ditch. I’d like to be nostalgic about the Kombi, but I danced with delight and relief when we finally got a real car and no longer had to take the Kombi out on highways.

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    1. Steve, your comment reminds me of the Ford Ranger truck I owned. It was not a good vehicle for winter driving on icey roads and I was glad to replace it with a vehicle that was more stable on slippery roads. I did like other features of the Ranger. I don’t miss the problems of trying to keep it from going into the ditch when driving in the winter. I suppose the people who worked at the Ford Ranger plant in St. Paul miss their place of employment.

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      1. When you sit in the Kombi, Jim, you notice two big bulges on the front surface right by your knees. That’s where the headlamps sit, which means that the only thing between you and anything you strike is a single panel of light metal. The Kombi was so light that driving it in gusty winds was a white-knuckled experience.

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  9. I don’t know if the image will show up, but my favorite product of all time, not because I ever used it, but just for the name, is Monkey Grip. That was another one of my suggestions for a good beer name.
    Okay, the image won’t post, but some good examples of the vintage cans can be googled, if you desire.

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    2. Just copied the URL and pasted it in the comment box and the images appeared for the Amazon products but not the CVS product.

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  11. i am getting pissed at word press. if it doesnt let me on ok but to let me on let me type for 20 minutes and then make it all disappear takes all the heart out of my aimless ramblings. maybe they hired an editor that eliminates mindless babble but if they did you will be hearing almost nothing form me from here on out. last night i wrote an epistle on my wild companions after i realized tha ti had misread the question and had a chance to contemplate my wild youth. it was a wonderful recall and when it disappeared after i laughed and snickered through my composing i didnt have the will to go back and try to redo it.
    same thing just happened on my vw post. i was only 5 minutes into this one but damn. if i go to word or something it takes the spontaneity away for me.

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    2. In one of my recent hospitalizations, my Mactop just wouldn’t interface with their WiFi. The only must-haves whenever in in this place are my Mactop and my Nicorette gum. I could stay forever as long as I have these. I called IT in; they couldn’t get me connected. The thought of being unable to interact in my little world of cyberspace was intolerable, so I called my brother nearly weeping. Bless his heart, he googled “traveling
      geeks” (something like that), found two who’d come to the hospital within an hour, and get me back online.

      They were there for two hours fiddling with Mactop, trying this, trying that. Ultimately, they got it connected! They also managed to do a few other unwanted things: cause Mac to be so incredibly hypersensitive that ever since, the slightest touch while I’m typing brings up one kind of pop-up box after another after another. I then have to hit the built in mouse to make it disappear, otherwise it stops the ability to type altogether. These pop-ups have a dozen different “helpful” offerings, none of which I want or need at all.

      Tim’s complaint is familiar because, ever since the geek visit, there’s something on the keyboard I keep accidentally hitting that makes everything I’ve just written delete itself. It can be a heartfelt email, a passionate progressive post on the opinion pages, or a Word document. Over and over this happens, each time having me question whether I have the motivation to write something all over again. I’ve tried so hard to figure out just which key is causing this, but can’t make it happen on purpose. This mystery is maddening! It seems that the geek guys over-fixed my Mactop and generated all sorts of functions I’d much rather not have.

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    3. I sometimes do a “Copy” after I’ve written for a long time, in case WP eats it before I get around to hitting “Post.”

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  12. the vw was the item to be recalled for me too. i have looked them up on ebay but they are expensive. when i was learning vw mechanics i found out that vw like other world companies in the 60’s had succombed to the pressures of cost effriciencies. in 1966 someone told then that if the made the engins block out of part aluminum it would save money so they added a little. in 67 68 and 69 they progressively added more unitl the engine was so lightweight it blew up at about 50,000 miles. the 66 67 were the ones to have. smaller less powerful engines that couldnt do over 50 ion uphill mountain roads but you got to look impudent at all the people as the passed you and you hippy entourage in their buick riverias and oldmobile 98’s.
    the vw van was obviously not a safe vehicle to have a head on collision in so i decided when i bought it to try to put that on the very top of the list of things to avoid in that car. there were very few other things that were off limits in that car but head ons was one. i had some of the best head of my life in that car but no head ons. it was truly a love mobile. 1969 was the hippy age in sanfransisco but in the suburbs of prestigeous west bloomington long hair was about as close as one could get. there wasnt a question about what car i needed and there was no second choice. i found this one with a home build camping out fit in the back built my a mr peepers high school shop teacher who knew how to build the fllding table in the side with a full set of cupboards behind and a little cubby of a closet next it to put you jacket or jumper cables in. it had the bench seat with dark brown vinyl covers sewn over the foam that transformed the bech seat to a love chamber double bed with a simple lift and pull on the seating area. there was a stash under the seat cfor sleeping bags and pillow so the love machine was a real live vehicle until it became otherwise. teh speakers in the back were an issue . they were too big but cool as could be. i ended up with giant 16 inch guitar amp speakers in plastic tubs with towels behind the cones that produced a sound that cwas loud enough to get over that 5000 rpm revving motor as i tooled down the road.

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      1. That’s one of the most interesting puns I’ve seen, Clyde. “The engine ceased at 52,000 miles.” I was expecting you to say, “The engine seized . . . .” The fact that rhyming are synonyms is just crazy!

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      2. maybe that was all they got. in reality know what i know now 4 bolts and a reground crankshaft is all it takes. i wonder how long it would take me today 40 years later. i know i wrote about my trip to the banff area where i blew the engine up. this was after rebuilding it in minneapolis just so i wouled be prepared in case i had troubles on the road. it took me forever to get it done in minneapolis and then when it went bad in canada it took from midnight when i got the car towed into the driveway at the house i was crashing at. until 7 am when i borrowed a car and took the crankshaft i had pulled out of the car after midnight and disassembeled in the basement. we drove to calary an hour away and had coffe for a couple hours while the ground the crank and then drove back assembled it and threw it in the cat the next morning had an issue or two but met the vw mechanic in banff while i was out cross country skiing and he got it going for 5 bucks and a smile. off we went to southern california. christmas day we ran into a mudslide that was anorther good chaprter on to the 5 foot snowfall in san bernadino where the van wrote the begining of the swan song

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    3. “the vw van was obviously not a safe vehicle to have a head on collision in so i decided when i bought it to try to put that on the very top of the list of things to avoid in that car.” Love that, tim. Me, too.

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  13. How I wish Saab was still an ongoing entity. If it were, and they brought back the 1993 model 900T, the 5 door model with a wonderful hatchback, I’d run right out and buy one. I’d be set for life. As it is, I hope my 1998, model 9000 CSE outlasts me. My “death car,” as my curmudgeonly Saab mechanic responded, when I told him I hoped never to have to buy another car.

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    1. An uncle of mine had a Saab back when they came with two-cycle engines. He had to add oil to the gas whenever he filled up. Imagine what a pain that must have been.

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      1. I remember those old Saabs, their engine sounded more like a lawnmower than a car. Our neighbor across the street in Copenhagen had one, a beautiful eggplant colored one, I loved it. They also had that front hood that opened toward the front, as did the Saab 900.

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        1. I can’t imagine, Clyde, that that was because of car trouble. Mine have proven to be exceptionally reliable cars.

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      1. I think Cadbury makes something that is like the Marathon bar… Curly Whirly (I think). Of course, I’m not sure where you can get the Curly Whirly either!

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        1. Who knew? I’m glad to read, however, that they didn’t actually contain chicken. Don’t get me wrong, I like chicken, just can’t imagine it in a candy bar.

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    2. I remember the Seven-Up candy bar coming up on another occasion, though I couldn’t tell you what we were discussing that day. Knowing how baboons are adept at talking about whatever we want to talk about, regardless of whatever the question of the day might be, it should not come as a surprise to anyone that some odd subjects will pop up from time to time.

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  16. Will have to read later. I want them to bring back the VW Microbus – I had a Kombi and two other pop-top vans in my day, and I still miss them.

    OT: Baboons gathering at Steve’s Sunday at 11 a.m.
    Another opportunity – Linda and tim will be there about 1:00 on Saturday, which is predicted mid-30s.

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    2. I, alas, will likely not be able to make it Sunday. I am recovering from some (planned) surgery…nothing to fret about, just makes getting out and about for periods of time (and lifting anything heavier than, say, 5 lbs) a challenge. 😦

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  18. When I was a kid, our family had a VW van (or bus? what’s the difference?). The kids named it “Smiley.” Lots of sibling fights in that car…

    I can think of two discontinued products I would like to bring back. The first is Trader Joe’s Fruit Infusion Tea. That tea was a wonderful fruity drink and it was soothing to sip a cup of hot Fruit Infusion Tea when feeling under the weather.

    The second is the type of illustrations that used to be in children’s chapter books. Books for kids around ages 8-12 used to have more illustrations, more full-page illustrations, and more occasional full-page color illustrations. One of my favorite books was King of the Wind by Marguerite Henry. There was a full-page illustration in that book that I absolutely loved (will attempt a link to it), the color full-page illustration of when Sham was born. Nowadays very few chapter books have illustrations, other than the cover illustration. And even fewer have color illustrations inside the book. I find this quite sad.

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    1. Not to mention the unbelievable illustrations by Howard Pyle, N. C. Wyeth, Arthur Rackham, Frank Godwin, Maxfield Parrish, John R. Neill, etc. I agree.

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      1. Yes. I think that a well-illustrated book adds so much to my enjoyment of the story. And some I would like to frame and put on my wall.

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      2. There are some wonderful, amazing, non-computer artists, like William Joyce and Chris Van Alsburg, still producing children’s books, but not chapter books.

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        1. yup – there are some great picture books out there, but I’m missing the good illustrations in chapter books that they used to have. It used to be normal to have quite a few illustrations, now it’s unusual. And it seems only “deluxe editions” have color illustrations.

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        3. A chapter book is any book where the story is broken into chapters, unlike the typical children’s picture book, which has a single short continuous story.

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  19. I did something anti-Black Friday- Son and I went to the city landfill and actually got rid of things instead of acquiring things. I cleaned the basement a couple of weeks ago and all the big things I threw out had to stay in the van until I found a day off to make it to the land fill. Brought four things to the framing store for framing, ate leftovers, and had a wonderful time with my family.

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  20. Just got Linda’s invitation to help Steve tomorrow. Oh, how I would like to. But I cannot take things. And I need to stay here. Good luck, Steve, and all.

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      1. OMG I better get there early so I can snag some of the good stuff . That sort of stuff you just listed might be gone before I get there and then I would be SO disappointed.

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        1. vs, if I were you, I’d be very careful of inviting baboons to your annual solstice party with it’s white elephant gift exchange. Someone is likely to end up with a stuffed trout or a Garrison Keillor bobblehead?

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        4. Steve, if you don’t find any baboons to relieve you of those items, they might just be very tempting to some theater for props. Just an idea.

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