In November 2017 we rented an RV from Cruise America, and it was this experience that culminated into Van Life and beyond.
How the Van Life Adventure Began
At the time, we were still exploring the possibility of buying a Tiny Home, with a great tiny home builder, TruForm Tiny, and our trip culminated in a visit to a tiny home expo in Portland Oregon, Great American Tiny House Show.
This was also our first trip to both Mt. Shasta and Ashland, Oregon, where work will take us in the near future. Definitely a great trip. But as we wrote about previously our series on tiny living and parking, we realized a Tiny Home wasn’t much of an option for us, though we still love Tiny Homes. So onto Van and RV Life.
Van Life or RV Life?
Full-time van peeps with children and/or pets, having lived both sides, I am amazed. Honestly, I would not full-time van for years with children. We are all-season outdoors family, so more space is required. Plus our kids have busy minds and hands. An extra 20′ of space gets you a place to hang guitars and put an electric piano for music lessons. Space to store artwork, and homework, and family games. Little nooks for stuffed animals and handmade crafts. Our residential refrigerator is covered in vivid drawings bursting with imagination and love, that only children can create.
Practically speaking we need both a van and an RV, for work and logistics. With both we get to still have the scent of homemade cookies baking in the oven while children are painting at the table. Mugs of hot tea during a family game night next to the small electric fireplace. Or tight-space yoga in the little living room created thanks to RV bump-outs. Our most cherished family game is Yoga Garden Game, that has traveled with us to five states and is tattered and worn.
Sure, you don’t need all these material things as any tiny living family will attest to, and we seem to always be outside anyways. That’s the real treasure of van and RV life. Mother Earth is our playground. Children can’t quite be outside cold, stormy, dark winter nights. Or cold rainy days (even though we still do it then, sometimes, too).
Thank You to the Many Who Came Before Us
I am grateful for all the tiny living peeps out there in the cyberworld that gave us ideas and inspiration on how to convert the RV and van for a family of 4 with 3 pets. Here are a few storage and organization resources we found most helpful: The Wandering RV, Go RVing, and Outdoorsy. But let’s be realistic, our 13-year old cats are the primary drivers of everything we do. They like their spacious away-from-the-chaos RV loft area. Permanent van life with an annoying dog and high energy kids? Not quite their forte, so it’s really all about making the well-traveled cats happy.
Why Van Life and RV Life Works for Us
What makes a good life? That is the question we all answer for ourselves. Back to the why. Whether in a van, and RV, or any type of configured home on wheels, there is a feeling of freedom that can only be lived. If you’ve been reading our posts at SprinterFam, you know we’ve been living in a combination of an RV and Sprinter since last June. This is the story of how we got there.
This whole path was an accident, or maybe it wasn’t. We agreed together, RV and van life is a much better idea than being a modern-day serf to an exploitative California landholder. Our family had to get really savvy really fast, if we wanted to enjoy the life we moved (temporarily) to California, to have. We realized most middle-class Americans in California can’t afford to do much of anything, because they are house-poor. We quickly realized we did not want to rack up massive debt simply to have a stick-built roof over our heads, and we were in the process of exiting an experience with a horrible landlord. Renting again was not an option for us, and we stubbornly decided we wanted to make it a life goal to not to ever, ever pay a California landlord another cent. We love you California, but not the system that’s been created there that keeps so many people indentured.
And then comes real freedom. And all the gratitude for the hardship that led us on the grandest adventure, of friendship, simplicity, and more than I could have ever imagined could come out of throwing off the chains of the idea that you “have to” give your kids a “home.”
Home is Where Love Is
A life where anything is possible and there is no “have to” but only “how can I” live my life in a way that matters, within what I am given. And to be given the gift of the love of animal souls and children souls is priceless.
But, the most profound lesson of all: home is wherever love is. This is why Van Life: not a place, but a presence. And that is how SprinterFam was born. Because you can put us in a castle, or in a van, and we are still us. It’s not the castle that ever made anyone within it worthy, after all. Your material possessions will never be merit badges to prove your life when you die. Merit badges are only carried in one’s heart, and that, certainly, does go with you for eternity. We need not fear letting go of what we love, when we let go of all the notions of what is important to hang onto.
What’s Next?
We’ve decided to leave Santa Cruz, California and create a home base in Ashland, Oregon, and are excited to see where this current adventure takes us. It’s certain that Van Life and RV Life are now in our blood. We have our Van Home, vome, that we’ll fill with love until it’s driven to its end.
Let me modify, or clarify, from the comment above that home is a not a place but a presence. Our hearts know, home is where love is, and it can be re-created over and over in a new place. But the presence of home can be felt more potently in a place that has been filled with it along the march of time. It is nice to have some reminders and memories carried along in the same space on the ride. And that is probably the reason our vome is our sentimental treasure.
…and so the adventure continues.
