After Selling the Van, I Still Hear the Road Calling
I’ve been thinking a lot about vanlife again—what it gave me, and how deeply it aligns with who I am. There’s something I didn’t fully realize until I stepped away from it for a while. When you live in a house or apartment, you don’t get to choose who your neighbors are. You don’t get to decide what your view looks like. Sometimes it’s a wall, or a street, or someone else’s roofline. You try to make it cozy, maybe throw some curtains up or add plants to the windowsill—but in the end, you’re still staring at something someone else chose to build.
In the van, it was different. I always got to choose. My front door could open to a beach, a forest, a desert, or a dirt pull-off overlooking the Pacific. I could wake up to sunrise over the mountains or watch the stars from the back of the van, curled up in a sleeping bag. I wasn’t limited to one location or stuck with one view—I was free to go wherever my heart pulled me. And there’s something incredibly healing in that.
About six months ago, I wrote about why I sold the van—the financial realities, the need to reset, pay things down, and find steadier ground. It was the right call for that moment. Letting it go showed me what it had quietly given me: not just mobility, but alignment. Space to choose my view, and with it, the pace and presence of my days.
Looking back, it makes sense why this lifestyle feels natural to me. I grew up with parents who loved road trips. We had a 1986 VW Westfalia—boxy, slow, and full of life. I still remember days at the beach with sand in the van and salty hair from surfing all day. I remember camping in the redwoods, the wind in the trees, and the smell of my dad’s camp coffee in the morning. Those memories are stitched into who I am. I didn’t know it then, but those early adventures planted the seed for the freedom I still crave.
When I’m in a van, I feel like a part of my dad is still with me. He loved his van and the simple lifestyle it opened up for our family. Little things bring him back—cracking the windows at night, coffee on a camp stove, unhurried mornings, finding a pull-off with a better view. It’s not just nostalgia for a vehicle; it’s a thread back to him, and to how he taught me to move through the world with curiosity and care.
Vanlife also changed how I think about resources. I didn’t have to pay for power—my solar-powered battery soaked up the sun, and flipping on a light felt like a small thank-you to the day. Water was different. It was limited, and I felt every drop. You learn quick dish-washing, and how to stretch a rinse. That limit made me pay attention. It made me slow down. Those little rituals become a rhythm that’s easy to miss living the “normal way,” where water and power feel endless.
Sometimes, you have to let go of something to realize how much joy it brought you. The simplicity of vanlife—the slowness, the self-reliance, the constant presence of nature—stripped away so much noise. It reminded me I don’t need a big space to feel rich. I just need the right one. A view I chose. A moment that’s mine.
I’m not saying it’s perfect. Vanlife has its hard days too. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s this, your surroundings shape your spirit more than you think. And when you choose where you wake up—when you pick your own view every day—it changes how you see everything.
And if I’m honest, I have a feeling vanlife is in my near future again. It’s the environment where I flourish and find the most flow—simple, flexible, close to nature. When I live that way, everything else clicks into place.
