Bio-Deisel Vehicle

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Our current pressing dilemma is that of transportation. Our preferred methods of transport are walking and riding bicycles. A has been a life long bicycle rider while I gave up after my bike was stolen in 5th grade. We fell in love with bike riding back in Bali as it was our main means of transport beyond walking, which we did a lot of as well. And, we greatly enjoyed our bike rides and walks into town or just to the corner store, friend's house, birth center, wherever.

These days we own an old VW Vanagon Westfalia that you have seen pictures of on the blog. It really served it's purpose of getting us across the country safely, comfortably and with less expense than eating out and sleeping in hotels. For the daily drives around our town, the gas milage is a bit low for our liking and well, it's gas! We would prefer to not drive at all or, at least, I would. But, as someone serving women in the childbearing year, it's necessary for me to drive all over the place. Therefore, we would like to be able to run bio-deisel in our vehicle. We could drop about $3-8K and get the old VW engine pulled and converted to deisel. Or, we could purchase a more reliable vehicle with an existing deisel engine.

Outside of buying a truck, it's proving difficult to find a mid-sized vehicle that is both affordable and will fit our family life. We will be a family of five early next year, with two people in car seats and a large dog. By large, I mean he weighs about 130 pounds and is over two feet tall. He goes with us on camping trips and visits to the in-law. Therefore, we would like to have space for everyone. We sold both of our cars (VW Jetta and Subaru Wagon) before leaving for our trip around the world. We expected to be gone a year or longer so put the thought of vehicle needs out of our head for a while. Now, we are in a place where we would like to have something to drive that has less impact on the world and causes less harm than a gas guzzler like our Vanagon.

We have looked at a pre-owned Mercedes Wagon. We are currently looking at the pre-owned Jeep Liberty. Both the pre-owned Jetta and Passat Wagons are rather out of our price range. A would prefer us to look at the NEW Grand Jeep Cherokee but it is a bit expensive...okay, it's really expensive. And, it's new so the whole gig of re-using and not consuming more than we need would be shot. If you have any suggestions, please let us know!