The Body Art Carnivale!

The Australian Body Art Carnivale was held last week in Eumundi, Queensland. Eumundi is a gorgeous little town on the Sunshine Coast, famous for its markets which are held on Wednesday's and Saturday's each week.

The Carnivale is a celebration of colour, with many different art exhibitions and competitions held over the weekend. Wicked Campers jumped on board the event this year and sponsored the Vehicle "Show and Shine" competition and the Wicked "Vehicle Art" comp. We enlisted 5 local artists to paint our Wicked vans.

Now because we needed 5 vans up there, we needed 5 drivers. So we made it a girls weekend and drove up the coast on Friday afternoon; dumped the vehicles and hit the Masked Gallery Walk, a "pub crawl"of all the Art Galleries spread through the town. It was such a great event, we met dozens of awesome people, drank bubblies and ate delicious food (oh, the churros)!

The entire weekend was fabulous - a great mix of entertainment, music, food, friendships and karaoke. Congratulations to David Houghton who won the Vehicle Art competition with his fabulous "Avatar'' themed Wicked Camper.

Some pics from the wknd are below

Texts from last night

It's been a while since my last blog post and I can blame that on having way too good a time over Easter! All our Wicked depots were under the pump over the Easter break - many of our customer's who picked up vans were heading to a variety of festivals over the break and we hope you all had an amazing experience!

A feature of our Wicked Campers Facebook page is the 'Wicked one-liner of the day'. It has a pretty regular following, with fans writing in and showing their appreciation/loathing for various slogans we host on the site. I usually gather quotes from vans I see parked around town; or from quotes provided by Mrs Wicked, or mates at the office. Yesterday I couldn't find a suitable quote so I asked around the office and Ross showed us a website called 'Texts from Last Night'. This site is a gold-mine of quotes - all pretty much related to sex, drugs and alcohol - and all texts which have actually been sent. Some would be perfect on our vans; other's not so much.... here are some of my favourites:

I may have a concussion but the symptoms are the same as a hangover so I can't tell. Best 21st ever.

Important life lesson - flammable and inflammable mean the same thing

I saw a girl walking around campus with bandages on both her knees. I need to get her number.

Dude has a bag of wine attached to his belt. These guys don't f*ck around.

A horse told me not to drive home last night. I think there was a cop on top of it.

As an update to my previous post It's been two weeks since we started the Virginity competition, and our winning entries have been published online, you can view them here.

The Virginity Emails

Sometimes I can't believe I get paid to do the stuff that I do.

Like this week.

We're urging our customers to 'leave their message' on the inside of our Wicked Campers, to create a bit of a culture and attach some history/wisdom/character to each van.

One method we're using to encourage this is asking customer's to write in the vans 'how they lost their virginity'. We've incorporated this idea with an online competition, asking the public for their virginity stories. The best (most ingenious; yet true) stories will win a free Wicked 7 day roadtrip from Cairns to Sydney.

Well! I've never been so excited to check my email before...

The stories I've received so far are so intriguing! I do have my 'favourite' stories, but to keep it fair the Evangelism Panel will read all the entries at the end of each fortnight to select the roadtrip winner.

Here's a snippet of a story I received yesterday.

When i was 16, I broke up with my boyfriend of a year. After id broken his heart and he was sitting on the edge of his bed crying (yes, well he was only 16) I asked him if I could lose my vplates to him. Even though he was waiting for marriage (religious reasons) but I really wanted to have sex for the first time with him, not some random idiot.

So he gave up his virginity to me that day, only to have his mother walk into his room not expecting her religious son to be doing me from behind on the bed. Not such a good moment. After that afternoon I was never allowed to go back into that house. And she never believed him that it was the first time hed had sex either. Oops.

So i broke the poor guys heart, stole his precious virginity and got him grounded for a long long time. all in the space of about 4 hours...

How did you lose your virginity? Tell us here!

The Great Noosa Campout

Mary and I spent the morning in Noosa, at the media launch for 'The Great Noosa Campout', a 3 day event held over the easter holidays.

As I'm a bit struck for time I'll post some photos of the Noosa Campout van tomorrow, but I wanted to upload this footage from the launch. The major of Noosa, Bob Abbot spoke about the festival and gave Wicked Campers some lovely feedback! It's all here in this video.

Snaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaake!

You know what it's like on a Monday morning...you usually stagger into work, mourning the weekend and can't function until you have a shot of caffeine. This Monday morning started out like the norm and then at 9.10am, Ross our graphic designer yelped out from the bathroom. "F*ck!""... (pause)... "SNAKE!".

A massive green tree snake was patiently waiting for Ross outside the bathroom. Ross slowly shimmied his way past the imposing creature, and fortunately the snake slithered down the stairs. This photo attempts to capture the snake as it made its getaway; unfortunately he was a very camera shy snake.

It took awhile to get over the surprise, and we were trying to stop laughing in order to figure out strategies to keep the snake out, when we spotted something else slithering on the office floor. A massive lizard! The snake had obviously been trying to catch his breakfast from our office floor space.

A hilarious morning and a great way to start the working week! Hopefully there are no more similar surprises in stall later this week, though I reckon this would be the perfect time to slip a fake spider on someone's unsuspecting desk.

Father Ted in Australia!

Wicked are collaborating with the Tedfest festival down in Parkes, NSW. This is a completely unique festival and looks amazing if you're a fan of the cult TV show "Father Ted".

For those who don't know what Father Ted is, Wikipedia can help:

Father Ted was a situation comedy television program produced by the British television company Hat Trick Productions which first ran from 1995 to 1998 on Channel 4 in the United Kingdom. It starred Dermot Morganin the title role as the Irish Catholic priest Father Ted Crilly, and was set on the remote fictional Craggy Islandparish off the west coast of Ireland.The show follows the lives of Ted and his fellow priests, Father Dougal McGuire (Ardal O'Hanlon) and Father Jack Hackett (Frank Kelly), who are exiled on the island, living together in the Parochial house with the fourth main character, housekeeper Mrs. Doyle (Pauline McLynn).

The Tedfest van will feature as part of the Paddy's day festival in Sydney this weekend, so grab a pint o' guinness and wave your shamrock flags as it swings by!

Tedfest are putting on a fabulous deal for all Wicked punters:

- 3 Tedfest tickets for the price of 2 (saving of $250!)

If you're booking a Wicked Camper for the Tedfest festival you also get a wicked 5% discount (direct bookings only)! Ah, 'tis the luck of the Irish.

Our Wicked grafitti guy did an impressive job painting up the van, check it out:

2010 Sydney Mardi Gras: The Homo Float (sponsored by Wicked Campers)

The theme for the 2010 Mardi Gras was the 'History of the World'. Wicked Campers sponsored a group called 'Homo' who were celebrating the history of the moustache. A 4WD Delica was painted up with various moustached characters from history (Ned Flanders, Charlie Chaplin, etc).

Check out their fabulous footage in this quick 5-minute clip. The costumes at the parade are incredible!

A big hi-5 to Sister Mary who slogged away for weeks getting the float ready, gathering participants and creating dozens of sparking, hairy, and just plain hot moustaches.

Topless Swedish ladies

Thursday at work started like any other day in the office - a few phone calls, some emails, faxing to be done, a couple random requests... but at 10.30am I received a call from the Brisbane depot, telling me to 'come over urgently' and to 'bring the video camera'.

On arrival, I was greeted by 2 swedish girl's at the depot, who were topless and had been painted by our indigenous artist Nathan! Nathan, along with most of the depot staff were grinning like cheshire cats. I was given my mission: That I'd be in the car with a photographer from The Courier Mail and we'd be driving into the city to take footage of the girls (who would be flashing the public through the sun roof of one of our Wicked vans)!

Our car arrived first at Post Office Square in Brisbane (one of the most busiest pedestrian crossings in the CBD) and camera's were stealth-positioned at the go. A few minutes later the Wicked van appeared... it stopped at the pedestrian crossing and the girl's stood through the sunroof and started waving at the unsuspecting public! The reactions were priceless - most people laughed, or were shocked/ gobsmacked. After all, it was midday on a Thursday.

After about 20 seconds of putting on a show the girl's quickly yelled our expletives and lowered themselves back into the van.

The reason? A policeman proudly walked in front of the van and signalled for it to pull over. You couldn't script it any better, this would make fantastic footage! The cop was with our driver for a good 10mins, but our driver only received a $100 fine, for "Travel with vehicle with part of body outside of window". Not bad, considering what else he could've got them for.

Variety is the spice of life and that's why being a Wicked Evangelist is so much fun!

No rest for the Wicked

Been a busy week in the life of a Wicked Evangelist this week! Over the weekend Sister Mary, myself and Nathan flew down to Melbourne to show-off our new Wicked 5-seater vans. They were super impressed with the re-vamp to the Wicked fleet... I guess the biggest surprise for us was the amount of the 'older generations' who totally dug the vans! The grey nomads have noticed a big difference in the amount of Wicked vans they see on the road. They too were impressed with the Ultra 5-seaters, but quietly stated that they preferred the old beat-up Mitsubishi's they said they had character - I agree.

With a boozey 'Ocean' theme party held for all Travel Industry staff on the Saturday night, it was a struggle to back it up on the Sunday, with most exhibitors crawling into their stalls at 9.55am (the day opened at 10am). No rest for the Wicked though, last night (Weds) we had a table of 10 booked at the Backpacking Qld Masqerade Ball...our table took advantage of the free booze a little too much. And that's all I'll say about that!

There have been quite a few sponsorship/cross promo vans that have gone out this week -

Somewhere near Tapachula - A group from the States who are travelling around the east oast, promoting their documentary/movie called 'Somewhere near Tapachula' - this is based on the important work of an orphanage in Mexico, the orphanage reaches out to kids by teaching them surfing. The guy's will be getting their van painted in a Mexican theme at the movie's premiere in Sydney Harbour.

The Be Love Bus - A group of girl surfer's/film-makers/musicians from the States who are also travelling the east coast, raising awareness for the 'Keep A Breast' foundation.

Entirely World Famous - This is a NZ version of the 'Best job in the world'. Nicquel from Australia was the lucky winner of a 3 month holiday around New Zealand. She'll be filming and blogging about her experiences here.

We wish all these groups many fine memories (and a few regrets) on their roadtrips!

Save $$$ - book direct!

Phew, been a busy week and will continue to be in the coming weeks! My fellow Wicked Evangelists Mary and Nathan will be joining me at the Melbourne Adventure Travel and Backpackers Expo this weekend (Feb 20 & 21), being held at the Royal Exhibition Building in Carlton. Wicked Campers are giving away a 7 day roadtrip during the expo, will show-case the new El Grand (which is to be painted by our terrific indigenous artist Nathan at the show) and will be discussing the topic 'Drive yourself around Australia', a 30min presentation about The Great Australian Roadtrip. The discussion is held at 12.30pm daily. Entry to the expo is $5 at the door, or if you'd like free entry just print this voucher.

Speaking of saving money, we've also been focussing on creating more direct bookings. You can save a lot of cash by booking your campervan and travel arrangments directly, and to help out we've created a 'Discount' page on our Wicked Campers Facebook page. If you're travelling in a Wicked Camper, you can save a crapload of money by booking with our fellow travel partners. To check out the discounts on offer, visit our Facebook page and click the 'Discount' tab.

Mary is organising a float for this year's Mardi Gras which features a Wicked Camper as the centrepeice. The theme of her float is 'HO MO' - a group for homo's celebrating everything that's queer, especially the moustache! It's a fabulous concept and she's currently recruiting folks who'd like to join HO MO in Sydney on February 27. If you're interested, click here.

Signing off from the Broome depot - will be back in Brisbane tomorrow!

The Wicked Van Blues - by Rob Imeson

Here 'tis, direct to YouTube - Rob Imeson's "The Wicked Van Blues". This track will have your feet stamping in to time! I think we're the only campervan company that has had a song written about them - a real honour. I guess it shows that the joy of being in a Wicked Van is not only related to the van itself, but the culture and fun it creates.

Vote for Rob Imeson's "Wicked Van Blues" on Triple J's Unearthed - http://www.triplejunearthed.com/Artists/View.aspx?artistid=32343