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.
3 Unexpected Adjustments to Vanlife: From a Few Incredible Days in Grand Teton National Park
I was surprised how much my impression of it changed as I worked my way around the shore and then up the mountain for a bird’s-eye view. Phelps Lake is gorgeous, in a lot of different ways.
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.
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.
One Cabinet Down...
Trying to square up a cabinet that’s finished except for the back is completely ridiculous. We ended up having to build outside corner squares to brace our clamps on the two opposite corners of the cabinet and pull it into square.
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.
Making Great Headway
For about 60 seconds I felt like I was going to pass out with horror, but the solution is pretty obvious and not that big of a deal, even if it wasn’t going to turn out super pretty.
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?).