The Open Road is an iconic image.
Watery waves of heat rising off the blacktop, wheels purring as they rush over asphalt. The ever-changing picture show rolling by outside: the motley greens of a forest, the pastel brushstrokes of a desert, the sharp lines of a mountain, the open blue sky over a canyon. The windows rolled down, the radio turned up, and all the world before you, accessible from the endless miles of connecting roadways that weave and curve and loop their way across the land.
The road has always called to me. After graduating college, I decided to answer it. I packed up, built a tiny home into the back of a cargo van, and took off. Every step of the way was an adventure, from buying the van to saying goodbye to it.
You can read about it all here, starting with buying the van and converting it into a tiny home, a process which took 2 years. I took two major trips in the van: the first through Canada and around Alaska, and the second in a loop around the United States. Ultimately, Danica and I visited 25 American states and 4 Canadian states together, including national parks, capital cities, historic sites, and more.
Unfortunately, I realized that as great an experience traveling with Danica was, van life wasn’t really for me. In 2020 I decided to sell Danica and use the money to embark on new adventures, which you can read about on Pushpins and Passports.
What to Expect If You Throw Your Keys Away in a National Park
And what the hey, if I was going to be stuck in the parking lot until Monday, apparently hallucinating trail information, and things literally falling apart around me, I figured I would just pop open a cold one and watch Disney movies.
Wrapping Up Great Basin National Park
The Bristlecone Pines are worth a visit to the park all on their own. It’s difficult to capture the brutal elegance of their gnarled branches, the rich color of their weathered trunks.
The Problem with Jumping in the Deep End
I’m not writing this post to complain. I realized that this — everything being a total mess — is part of the whole experience.
I’m not failing at it, I’m doing it.
Spontaneous Side-Trips in Ashland, OR
The road took us past a large lake, then sloped up into the mountains, winding tightly along the cliff’s edge, bouncing up and down as the terrain demanded, tilting in places.
The Final Days Before The Pacific Northwest
Everything that I’ve been thinking about just to keep myself going for the last year and a half. The life I’ve been dreaming about is eight hours away.
A Few Thoughts on Americanism
Forth of July was the one day every year that I always felt unstoppable. It made me feel empowered, one person supported and held up by millions of people, like every dream I’d every dared to entertain was as close as those fireworks, falling down upon me from the stars.
I Destroyed Part of My Build
I was dead set on pretending I had no van, and that I’d never been crazy enough to start this insane project, for the rest of the day.
Construction 101: My Journey From Clueless to Clued-In
I don’t think I’d ever so much as touched a saw of any kind, I had no idea that 2x4 really meant 1.5 inches by 3.5 inches, and the descriptions of some of these screws sounded like gibberish to me (how can a screw be both a Phillip’s and flat? Why is it a #8 but it’s 2 inches long?).
Every Time I Think I'm Done...
I can’t help but think about what I would do differently if I were to do another build. There is one big thing that I wouldn’t do the same way over again if you dared me to.