Hello from the Pacific Northwest

[Bluesky-SKO]

Salutations, Bluesky here. I have always liked machinery, trucks, and busses. When I was young I wanted to live in a combine. I traded a ’69 Ford Supervan for a 1958 Chevy Viking conversion Bus sometime around 1995. My partner named it the Watzing Matilda. I lived in it in a Mobile Home Park in Austin Texas for Four years, drove it north to a cow pasture near West Texas. Cheap rent for student housing as I attended Texas State Technical College for Two years. Drove back to my property just outside of Austin, a lot in a colonia(sub-division with no utilities) and lived there a couple years until I moved back to Seattle. I kept the lot for a couple years, but the place got rensacked and the county threatened to clear it out and bill me, so I returned and cleaned out what I could and sold the Bus for $200 to a couple dudes from Texas A&M who were starting a party bus company. They wanted the front body parts, so it was perfect. I never got the title transferred, and it was an Iowa title too. For the last decade I have been haunted by dreams of sketchy neighborhoods just outside of town with sub-standard structures. There were a couple regular places I would visit that I had a plywood structure with little doorways and tunnels to get into with all my possessions in boxes inside. A few years ago, I purchased a bus in an RV community and the dreams ceased, but my dreams of bus life are still strong.

 

[magnakansas]

the bus in your signature

Hi, welcome. I saw a bus, about a week ago, that was mid fifties and the badging showed "6700" I thought this odd. And then, here you are. Would you please post a photograph of your bus?

william

 

[Bluesky-SKO]

William, I will post pictures, but I have a story too. I'll start a thread in the short bus section. Here is a picture of another bus:

I'll need to figure out how to post pictures...

 

[Bluesky-SKO]

how about this? Again, not my current bus...

 

[Bluesky-SKO]

Here is a picture of what my bus looked like before the conversion, this is a different bus, same model Chevy 6700. notice the narrow windows above the side windows.

 

[cowlitzcoach]

The green bus looks like a Kenworth Pacific T-215 from the mid-50's. The newest it could be, if it is a KW Pacific is 1957.

 

[Tango-SKO]

Love the 6700! And a high roof too.

 

[Bluesky-SKO]

The Kenworth was titled 1955. I called the Kenworth factory in Renton and asked if they wanted it for their museum, but they denied even having a museum.

The high roof was required, having lived in a bus before. I could only stand up straight in the center, it's hard on the spine over time. The high roofs were for highschoolers as I understand it.

 

[cycle61]

Hey, another PNW skoolie! Whereabouts are you in the area?

 

[Bluesky-SKO]

I am in Tukwila!