Five Reasons for Boondocking Off the Grid Now

The art of Boondocking off the grid is popular by many van and recreational vehicle (RV) owners. Simply put, the people who boondock are choosing to camp without electricity, water or sewer hookups. Although this method of RV camping has it’s challenges, it has many advantages too. One of the biggest advantages to boondocking is […]

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Highlights of the South Padre Beach Camp Out

Our van Alice is nimble on pavement, but she can get bogged down quickly in less-than-ideal conditions. Before visiting the area, I wouldn’t have even considered driving her through sand for a South Padre beach camp out. After spending three days on the island and assessing the risks of getting stuck, we decided to go […]

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Van Life and Living Content in a Small Space

Living content in a small space for an extended time is the goal for those who pursue van life. It takes some work to achieve this goal when sharing the space with others. We have the best experiences when we have a positive attitude and we go with the flow. Like the Person You’re With […]

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Our Road Trip Meals in Alice

There is excitement in the air as we plan for an Alice (Sprinter Van) trip.  We look forward to exploring the country and making up our agenda one day at a time. One of the critical steps is planning our road trip meals. When we travel, Gail is our meal planner and Head Cook.  She […]

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The Blue Ridge Parkway Sunset

Blue Ridge Mountain Sunset_Steve and Gail

The Blue Ridge Parkway is a scenic 469-mile winding road from Shenandoah National Park in Virginia to the Great Smoky Mountains National Park in North Carolina and Tennessee. We traveled on the top ridge of the mountains as we drove the southern end of the Parkway.  The road twisted and turned and each new vista […]

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10 Tips for a Successful Road Trip

Are you planning a long road trip to your favorite destination? We have a few tips we have learned on how to make traveling more fun. 1. Planning for the Road Trip If you have read other posts on this blog, you know that we advocate for traveling slow through the countryside. The challenge with […]

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Should You Convert or Buy a Van?

The Van Life culture is a growing movement that lures in people of all ages and income levels. The free spirit mindset that this lifestyle embraces is an indicator that people want freedom and simplicity in their lives. The question many ask when making a purchase is, “should we convert or buy a van”? The […]

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Plan Less, Experience More

How do you plan a trip when you want to make it up as you go? Our preferred style of traveling with Alice is to have as much flexible time as possible. We research an area pretty heavily when we decide on a destination. However, we have learned that no matter how much time we […]

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Underground Storage for Alice

Where do we store Alice when we are not using her? Alice is big and tiny at the same time. She is about 7 feet wide which is about the width of a large pickup truck. She is 24 feet long so she is too long for many normal parking spaces and about 11 feet […]

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A Tour of Alice

It was a sunny and warm December day and we had been missing Alice so we got her and took a drive through the country outside of the Kansas City area.  It was a joy to see Alice again after being in storage for 6 weeks! Since many people have asked us what Alice looks […]

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Van Life By Design Introduction Video

We call our written travel journal Alice’s Memoirs which stays with us in the van while we travel. We also journal when we had our boat and it’s a wonderful way of recalling where you have been, who you were with and funny side stories about important moments.  People have been journaling  for as long […]

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From Boat Life to Van Life

A year ago, we were discussing our lives as boaters as we seemed to be at a crossroad. Twenty eight years earlier we had purchased our first boat when our kids were young and the new boat was something all of us enjoyed doing together. The question at hand a year ago was, what should […]

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