extra extra
We made the local paper. Fame and fortune to follow.
We made the local paper. Fame and fortune to follow.
Living in a van with no AC while driving through places named ‘Death Valley’ is no joke.
We didn’t so much drive across Canada as become possessed with our mission: Disney or Bust. Our initial planned route through the backwoods and small towns of ‘Murica was stymied by ICBC’s archaic and medieval insurance restrictions, so we made a beeline for the hills.
While we waited for Stormie to ship across the ocean we spent time at our family cottage in the Laurentians of Quebec.
We spent more time in France than any of the other countries combined. That may not be a statistical certainty, but it sure seems probable.
Amsterdam. The city was magical and hazy and beautiful and flawed and it smelled delicious.
The cuteness of the Welsh ponies in Wales was so overwhelming that I remember nothing else of our short time in the country.
England gave us a welcome fit for the Queen. As it were, it was also the Queen’s birthday, so it seems the welcome was not entirely for us and was, in fact, actually for the Queen.
Reporting my observations of our time in each country is a daunting task, especially given my irrational fear of an inevitable and slow decent into dementia. Summing up said observations in a single blog post is absurd and maddening. In every day there exists innumerable occasions where we are privy to the minutiae of our … More Germany (and other things)
The number of countries that Robbie has had to drag me out of, kicking and screaming (and pouting), has increased by one. Generally, I am pretty excited to move down the road and see what the next country has to offer in terms of culture (food), camping (food), and history (wine) but, when a country … More Austria (but upon review, mostly Vienna)
There appears to be at a very minimum seven different way to say ‘hello’ in Hungary, depending on the time of day and your relationship with the other speaker.
The little country that could. It is green. It is friendly. Its street food includes ‘burek’, which is basically a version of a croissant stuffed with cheese curds and fried. Slovenia, I love you.
After being lulled into a resting, dream-like state of existence in Provence, we realized just how much of the continent we’d not yet seen and mildly panicked. We have since made a minor push to get to eastern Europe, which meant that our time in Italy was cut much shorter than we would have liked. Truly, … More ciao ciao!
Spending much more time eating that blogging these days, so here are some Coles Notes.
Sometimes our version of perfect isn’t a deserted beach or unmarked road. Days like this, here in Tarifa, Spain, are how we re-charge our social batteries. We have met some amazing characters on the road, and I love learning about the motivations behind their decision to travel. There are people of all ages and … More #adventuremobile
We have left Portugal, which was as difficult a sentence to type as it is to believe. But, as it were, we are addicted to the open road, and there is still a lot of continent to explore.
I can’t say that coming to Europe during the shoulder season was entirely a conscious decision. Rather, after two years of saving and planning we sensed within ourselves a need to actually just go, before we continued saving for eternity and eventually settled on something more ‘responsible’ and ‘adult’ to do with our travel fund. … More off-season
Whereas France felt like home because we were so comfortable in a life not entirely dissimilar to our lives in Squamish, what I love about Portugal is that we are so far removed from that comfort and yet it still feels like home. The language is alarmingly unfamiliar, save for the few simple phrases we’ve … More portugal.
We sort of bombed through northwest Spain in our push for the south of Portgual. We wanted to stay, but knew we had to go. We could have spent six months exploring this coastline. Imagine, that it would be difficult to see an entire continent in under a year.
We spent three weeks in France and only 15 euros on camping. Finding wild camping spots is a tricky business, less about finding places that you are ‘allowed’ to camp, and more about finding places that you aren’t ‘not allowed’.
We are eating our way through France and I am going to level with you: it all leaves very little time for blogging.
While there are varying visa restrictions throughout the continent for long and short-term stays, the majority of movement throughout the EU’s internal borders is protected by the Schengen Visa, a rule that governs 26 countries in Europe. The Schengen Area is a delightful (sarcasm) little area that consists of all the EU countries excluding Ireland … More Part I: how the Schengen Zone made me her bitch.
The end of November marked one year of van ownership. I so clearly remember the moment we stepped out of the insurance office, transformed into the trepidatious new owners of a 40-year-old vehicle upon which rested my expectations of unfiltered joy and adventure. The weight of that first step-the foundation upon which we were building … More the van-a TSN turning point
The VW community is a remarkable thing. When was the last time you shared a knowing smile and a tip of the hat with your fellow Mazda 3 or Honda Civic owner? This kinship and camaraderie is a prestigious honour reserved solely for owners of VW vans or buses. Admittedly, for me it is less … More Peace, Love and Volkswagens
“It is a paradoxical but profoundly true and important principle of life that the most likely way to reach a goal is to be aiming not at that goal itself but at some more ambitious goal beyond it.” – Arnold Toynbee “A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.”– Lao Tzu … More stop wishing, start doing