Blog

We just passed the one-year mark of owning the van and are gearing up to leave again after hunkering down for the winter.

As we have been preparing for our upcoming departure, we have spent a lot of time talking about what we have learned since we first said bon voyage to the 9-5 and Hello to vanlife.

Here is what we wish we knew before hitting the road!

1. Embrace the sucky days

Let’s be honest, it doesn’t matter who you are or what you do, you are going to have bad days.

Vanlife is no different.

Sure, our Instagram might make it seem like we are living our best lives, chasing sunsets, and singing “Hakuna Matata” as we stroll down pristine beaches without a care in the world, but that is only part of the story. What Instagram doesn’t show is when we are at our wits’ end because nothing is going to plan, when we are on the verge of a breakdown from being stuck in close quarters for days at a time, or when life on the road has been grinding at us and we just want to throw in the towel.

Vanlife isn’t easy.

In fact, it can be really, really hard.

(For more information about some of the challenges we dealt with, check out our post on The Five Worst Things About Vanlife here!)

If you are not careful, you can lose perspective and forget about all the great things that also come with the lifestyle.

 Sure, there are bad days, and yes, bad things do tend to come in threes, but if it wasn’t for those darker times, it would be nearly impossible to fully enjoy the good times.

 So yes, vanlife is hard, but embrace it because it is also incredible and wonderful and everything it is cracked up to be.

2. Research, research, research 

When we first embarked on our vanlife experiment, we were extremely naive. We thought we would just go with the flow and drive wherever the road took us. We had no idea just how much planning went into vanlife.

As it turns out, you can’t just drive around on a whim and find places to camp and cool places to visit – It takes a lot of planning.

For us, the majority of our time was spent planning. We would have to:

-Pick a destination

– Plan a route

– Identify places to camp

-Find places to fill up on water and supplies

-Figure out if we would have cell phone service (and plan accordingly if we wouldn’t)

– Check the weather and plan how to ration power sources

And the list goes on and on!

Then there were times where we had to plan around unexpected events like:

-Forest fires

-Family emergencies

-Seasonal road closures

-Van breakdowns

-Global pandemics

 and the like.

Long story short, it takes a lot of work to be spontaneous and those who do not come up with a solid plan (or two) are sure to run into some trouble along the way. For some tips and tricks on how we plan all of these things check out our post here!

3. Establish a routine 

Some might think that vanlife is the ultimate escape from routine – and that’s not too far from the truth.

Each day brings new adventures and surprises as you are slowly migrating with the weather. But, just because vanlife isn’t very routine doesn’t mean you should abandon routines all-together. In fact, we learned just how quickly we needed routine to stay productive, healthy, and to provide our lives with some sense of normalcy as we traveled.

So, make a routine and stick with it. Think of including things like what time you wake up, when you go to bed, what time you like to eat your meals, exercise, and of course, when you will work.

These routines do not have to be a stringent as the ones people have in a more traditional lifestyle, but they are absolutely necessary to keep yourself anchored when you are living a life that is anything but.

Speaking from experience, when we first started, we did not have a routine. We just did what we wanted, whenever we wanted to do it. This approach didn’t work, we found that we would waste so much time. Days would pass where we would not go anywhere, or do anything. Then our time in a place would be up so we would pack up, move camp, and do it all over again.

After several weeks of this we decided to make some changes. We still had plenty of downtime, but we were more intentional about meeting people, hiking, exercising, writing, and more. We found that by establishing a routine we were able to better enjoy our time, we slept better at night, and we had more energy to experience the places we were in.

4. Not everyone ends up in this lifestyle by choice

One of the biggest lessons that we learned is just how fortunate we are to have chosen this lifestyle.

The truth of the matter is that many people who live the nomadic lifestyle are forced into. While traveling, we met several people who never intended on living life on the road, but circumstance forced their hands.

In many of these cases, people are struggling to get by. They don’t have fancy vans with souped-up amenities, they don’t have the means for fancy vegan meals – many of them have little more than the clothes on their backs.

When we learned this, we knew we wanted to give back in any way we could so we decided that we would always keep a selection of teas, coffees, and extra food on hand. We knew we couldn’t change someone’s situation, but we could offer them a hot drink or a warm meal. So that is what we do.

 Our approach is simple, any time we meet someone who we hit it off with, we invite them over for food. If it is past supper time, we invite them to stop over in the morning for a coffee or tea.

We try to do this for everyone we get to know for several reasons:

1. We do not know their personal situations.
2. Everyone enjoys being taken care of from time to time, and there is no better way to take care of someone than offering something warm and comforting.
3. Regardless of the person’s situation, we want to show them our appreciation and give back to the community that has been so great to us.

So, if you are considering Vanlife – or if you are already a nomad, remember others that you might meet and try to find ways to build them up, because you never know what they might be going through.