How We Find Free Campsites Across the US When we hit the road in Stan the Tan Van a few years ago our biggest goal was budget travel— how to explore the beauty of the US inexpensively. One of our top money saving tips while traveling is—free camping. When we say free camping we don’t mean truck stops, Wal-Mart, or street overnight parking. We’re talking about awesome campsites in nature. We’ve found two easy-to-use, and free resources that help us…
Get Your Vehicle Road Trip Ready It’s that time again. Time to get ready for road trip season! The awesome feeling of hitting the road and exploring new exciting places—like South Dakota’s Corn Palace (hey, don’t knock it)—is just around the corner. Make sure your vehicle is road trip ready with this essential road trip checklist. It’s safe to say everyone wants their road trip to be problem free, however if your vehicle isn’t prepared for a long journey, car…
What’s this Journey to Alaska all About? If you missed last week’s post here’s a quick summary of what this is all about. We’re planning a 3-month road trip to Alaska this summer in our self-converted camper van—Stan the Tan Van. The state known as the Last Frontier boasts 6,640 miles of coastline, the tallest mountain in North America, 100,000 glaciers, and over 322 million acres of public lands. While Alaska is a dream destination for many outdoor enthusiasts, planning…
I’m not sure if I’ve ever been this excited to share a blog post with you all! I mentioned this trip in our 2019 Travel Plans and Goals, but now it’s official—we’re journeying to Alaska this summer. And you’re invited! Since the cat’s out of the bag (which is a very weird saying IMHO) let’s jump right into all the juicy Alaska details, shall we? What Exactly is the Journey to Alaska all About? Alaska has been one of our…
It’s that time again—time to reflect on what the last 365 days have brought and start planning for the next year of adventure. Unless it’s a leap year, then you’re thinking about 366 days. Does anyone else also think that leap year is so very strange? Here I am—getting off-track already. Let’s talk about some 2019 travel plans and goals, shall we? The project manager in me loves a good list so last year I compiled all our travel plans…
When we hit the road in Stan the Tan Van after our European travels, we realized something—this isn’t just a trip or a “gap year” for us anymore. This is how we live our life. I think that’s why we were so excited to attend Descend on Bend 2018. We were very interested in meeting more people in the vanlife community. Through social medial we know there’s a lot of folks out there, but since we’re all mobile we don’t…
It’s hard to believe that a year has passed since we packed up the few remaining things we own and left our beloved Portland for the open road. This has undoubtedly been the biggest year of travel and change in our lives. With our one-year travel anniversary (or should I say vanniversary?) upon us, we’ve been thinking a lot about what we’ve learned and what’s different than a year ago. Our goal on this blog is not only to share…
The Work Vanlife Balance, Volume 6 Slow down? That’s right, I said it. I’m officially old. Next thing you know, I’ll be telling you to, “Stop, and smell the roses.” Don’t worry, I won’t go that far. Unless you go to a botanical garden or something, then you should probably stop, and smell those roses. We’ve talked a lot about how to be a digital nomad. Disconnecting from things, finding a career, technology needs, and mobile workspaces are all import…
5 years ago, if you told me that today I’d be a minimalist living in a van, I would’ve laughed my ass off and said, “No way!” Living in van? Maybe—at least temporarily. But Minimalism? Isn’t that for people who like modern furniture and dress all in black and white? That’s definitely not me. For years Tom talked about living in a tiny home. I was adamant that we couldn’t live that way. We needed space, and a giant dining…
A couple of weeks ago we hit the road again with Stan the Tan Van. Our destination? The sunny Florida Everglades. We had high hopes of replenishing our vitamin D and diminishing our resemblance to a couple of pasty vampires. Even though on our first night, I came down with my second bought of flu this season (looks like there’s a flu shot in my future from now on), it felt so good to be back on the road again….