I’ve been sharing about the conjunction of Jupiter and Venus as they peaked this week, but if you’ve seen my posts on social media, you know I’m currently scrambling looking for a new van.
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My van is currently stranded in Sedona. But it could have been worse. I could have gotten stranded in the desert. Or up a mountain. Or in the wilderness, camping alone.
I got stranded in the one spot where friends could help me, and it’s marked the death of my van.
Back at the beginning…
I started living on the road full-time in May 2025, and got my first van in July 2025 after living out of my Kia Soul for 1.5 months. I purchased it on the fly after getting paid for some conference speaking, something I could convert quickly into a bed and storage for telescope equipment and get on the road.
It was a 2015 Ford Transit Connect Passenger XLT with a whopping 235,416 miles on it. Besides a non-functional radio, there wasn’t much actually wrong with it, and for the past year, it’s taken me literally everywhere you’ve seen me go: across the country East-West four times & N-S six times, exploring all around California, New Mexico, Arizona, Oregon, and Washington’s Olympic Peninsula.
But it was old, and I demanded A LOT of that van.
Between July and early December 2025, not much went wrong with it. The biggest special maintenance was to replace the front CV axle, which, after some off-roading in October, had begun clicking on me during left-hand turns.
In late December, my ABS/TC system started malfunctioning, causing my odometer and power steering to act up, but corrected itself after a week and went five more months without an issue.
2026 started out well for this van. It took me from Florida to New Mexico for the lunar eclipse, then New Mexico to Arizona for sidewalk astronomy in Sedona and camping in Flagstaff, then to California, where I explored Death Valley, the southern Eastern Sierras, and zigzagged up to San Jose for a private event, then all the way down to San Diego for sidewalk astronomy.
After San Diego, I got new brakes, new rotors, new tires. Boom, all fresh. Suspension was the next fix, and I had that scheduled upon my return to Arizona in June.
But…then the big issues began.
Starting in early May, I drove up through California and around Oregon. The day after Mount Shasta, I went to Crater Lake–and got a flat tire 20 miles from the nearest town. This apparently glitched out my ABS/TC because from that point forward, my odometer and power steering went poof.
A day later, my ignitions started getting rough, and the engine started getting sluggish.
Oh. And the sliding door fell off the bracket. Because I needed THAT to happen.
By now, being on the Oregon coast, I pulled right up to Les Schwab and got a tune up, replaced the back tires (the one of which had gone flat near Crater Lake), and looked at what other services I needed. When stuff starts failing one after the other…yeah. Something’s wrong.
Then Astoria happened.
If you recall this post, my AC compressor popped off in Astoria literally two days later. After ALL that had just happened, this was the expensive fix. $2,400 by itself.
Plus the diagnostics.
Plus the tires I’d just gotten.
In three days, I dropped $3,500 on that van, more than 50% of my savings.
And then, the transmission.
Over the next week, it got me to Mount Hood. To Sisters. To Lake Tahoe. To the Ancient Bristlecone Pines. To Joshua Tree National Park. To Phoenix. And back to Sedona.
Where, after five days, it stalled out on me.
In 24 hours, I dropped another $1,200 on this thing, from a tow truck, to a new battery (which, admittedly was fluctuating), to two diagnostics–the second of which found the transmission had failed.
I find it remarkable, honestly, that it failed when it did. It could have stalled on any of the mountains, any of the forests, any of the vast deserts–but instead, it stalled in a populated town, near car shops, and close enough for my friends in Phoenix to pick me up.
Also shout out to the shop for allowing me keep my van there while I reset life.
And that’s where I’ve been stuck
As a result, I had to cancel four private stargazing tours and five nights of free sidewalk astronomy between Sedona and San Diego.
I’ve been searching for and test-driving vans all week. Most were meh, some were underwhelming, and only one has truly been the one. It’s the same size as my other van, which is ideal because it means I don’t need to do much of a build. Once I build the lower frame, I can just slide in the main bed and storage frame in, saving days of work in the Phoenix heat (although I’m going to change it from a folding frame to a permanent frame.
I’m going to Pennsylvania for a week, so if the van is still available when I return, it’s mine, and I can get back on the road.
If you would like to help
Any support is truly appreciated, whether through regular tips, or by purchasing my books and travel photography. All books and stocked photography will come with my travel stickers included, and a special print of the Moon.
My 22nd writing anniversary!
Tomorrow’s a big day. While I won’t be celebrating due to flying across the country to PA, it’s a day that’s as important to me as birthdays are to others (I typically don’t celebrate my b-day).
On June 12th, 2004, I started writing sci-fi novels! Fresh out of the 6th grade, I laid down on my carpet with a pad of yellow paper and a pen, and started scribbling out my first sci-fi book: Shadows: The Narlan Wars.
This would lead me down a path to writing the sequel, Shadows: The Resurrection, and then during the first couple years of college, I completely rewrote both books into a single volume, Shadows: The Second Rising (cover made by my high school friend, Mike).
I wrote a bit of the next book (again by hand) before abandoning that project in favor of my current sci-fi series that you’ve seen at my sidewalk astronomy nights and elsewhere.
Writing was formative to my identity, and created a cascade of butterfly effect events that led directly to me entering the education field and starting Sidewalk Science Center and The Hiking Astronomer.
Everything you seen, everything I do–it all goes back to that notepad I started writing my first book on in June 2004, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
I’m currently 82,000 words into Book 6, Annex, of a planned 130,000 words. Annex has a tentative publication date of October 2028.
This world is beautiful.
Alex
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