Monday (tomorrow?) I leave for CO\UT. With a little WY thrown in. Prepping is so much different now that I gave up my brick and mortar for a van. I mostly prepped for a couple weeks. Now it’s for ? Everything I own is either in a 10 by 15 storage unit or Im driving it down the road (or trail). I must of packed/unpacked/packed the van 5 times in the last week. I’ve got my MTB and my KTM (which I call g-bike) (gas) with me.

Now that I’m a full time vanlifer, at least for the foreseeable future everything I bring along must be something that’s needed. Bring only what you need, nothing you don’t. You just have room for the needed things and not the wanted things. I’ve scoured the forums on what others do but really everyone is different as to what they use and don’t use. Me, I’m not so big on cooking so my dinner prep devices are minimal. I did buy a egg cooker at Walmart for 14 bucks as I like hard boiled eggs and I must say Im impressed with how good it works. No boiling, no hassle. Other than that it’s mostly microwave dinners. Canned soups and things like that, sandwiches and cereal and oatmeal for breakfast. Yogurt too. Pretty simple.

Also I had to pretty much bring all my clothes along. About twice what I usually take. So all my packing ratios got screwed up. Way more of one thing equals way less of another. Then toss in the motorbike and all its needful things and I had to make some decisions on what to do with other things. Not to fret too much as I’m thinking I’ll be back in WI by the end of the month. Taking care of some work related things and maybe staying around for the 4th. After that I’m not sure.

To me this open road van life thing is a little stressful. Not 100% sure where I’ll be in a month is weird to me. I’m not used to that. So I stress out and try to build out my next month as best I can but it changes many times. Im sure in time I will want to spend a couple or even more months in one place but don’t know where that would be. On one hand I would like it to be in cool places but in the other I would like to stay closer to kids\grandkids. The struggle is real trying to juggle both scenarios. It’s hard. Finding a place to rent short term is impossible unless you AirBnB it for 5 grand per month. That’s not possible for a guy on Social Security. I spend way too much time on the interwebs looking for that perfect scenario. Maybe a place I can hang out a while. With the gas prices I think all full timers are staying in one spot longer and that’s what I might have to do. Or not. How do I know, Im new at this. Here goes nothing.

DLD