Big day.

Today, exactly two months after I moved up here and the work on reconstruction began, the Photo Palace Bus was officially registered at the DMV and is now bearing a title of Motorized Home instead of the commercial Bus designation.  Hooray!  I have heard that the reclassification process can be a hassle depending on the person that you get to help you at the DMV.  Luckily the inspector who looked at our rig was apparently taken aback to the days of his youth at the sight of us and all he could talk about is how cool it is and how he used to ride a bus exactly like ours to school every day (I wonder if he ride a Crown, as they are much more numerous and do look nearly identical to Gilligs of those days).  We had no problem convincing the officials that this vehicle will no longer be used to transport more than 15 people and the fact that the conversions are not finished yet didn't seem to faze them either.  Here are a couple of snapshots from our trip.

Here is me at the DMV right before I told the lady who helped us that this is one registration she should really try to remember:

Here is Ryan battling his Mamiya 645 (one does not 'work' with those cameras - they demand a battle)
Notice how clean the interior looks - next week we'll put up the walls and you won't be able to see through like this any more:

A nice little view from the drivers position while waiting in line for the inspector to do his thing:

And here are the results of the venture - two nice shiny plates which will carry us forward until we get the personalized license plates in support of California Arts Council:

Last night the bench interior was painted black to protect and beautify our storage/guest bedroom structure:

Plus the last of the freestanding walls went up  - it will house the space heater for the cold nights, and will also have a little matching table-top on it for drinks and miniature tripods:

OK - now that we are all set to be driving about and are going to concentrate on trying to find a place to install the top level of the Palace.  If anyone reading this knows people who do fabrication, let us know.  Before that time though, electrical and darkroom have to be complete, so... back go work I go.

AO