A Farewell to Abbey Road

She rolled down her car window as I stood in the parking space next door, guiding Bill and Abbey Road between the lines. “Hey,” the woman said, resting her forearm on the sill. “Good luck with your marriage.”

I turned, my arms still outstretched. “My parents almost divorced after a week in one of those,” she added before placing her Subaru in reverse and jetting out of the Sedona, AZ public lot.

Fair to say our marriage survived. During our #vanlife experiment, Bill learned to let me finish burrowing through the upper compartments before he launched the search for shorts or fleece. I learned to abdicate the passenger seat for his evening comfort. No need for picnic tables or camp chairs. He was comfiest in the fake leather seat turned towards the cabin. Neither of us learned to not issue instructions while the other drove.

On the final lap to Denver, the Friday van drop off date looming, we reflected on the adventure, on living in 140-square feet, what we would miss, what we wouldn’t miss, what we learned. Were we #vanlife converts?

No. And yes.

Bill looked forward to not bumping his forehead daily on the shelf above the driver’s seat. He feared that the head dents had become permanent. He looked forward to a dresser full of drawers and his own closet, an end to rifling through two upper bins and all of his clothing to change his shirt. He wouldn’t miss sleeping in his clothes, tripping over the throw rug, and stumbling on the uneven steps leading into the van. #vanlife can be inhospitable to someone with Parkinson’s. He would not miss driving six, eight, nine hours a day.

Likewise, I couldn’t wait to stop unzipping all seven packing cubes each time I needed a sock switch. I wouldn’t miss washing in cold water because we’d forgotten to turn the water heater on. I would not miss the ever-hovering fear of harming this $92,000 land yacht, as our friend Casey dubbed the behemoth. The items that did break – the kitchen faucet, the closet door – could be easily repaired. But a splintered windshield or cracked undercarriage? Watch that $1,250 damage deposit evaporate. I would NOT miss the aching butt of all-day driving sessions.

But then, on our second to last day, as we rolled down an empty stretch of Wyoming 287, the jagged Tetons on our right, acres of cattle-dotted plains on our left, the sedentary frustration dissipated. Instead, I marveled at the images before me, and images behind. Images of fly fishermen casting into roaring rivers. Images of dense forests and dark green valleys. Images of red clay mesas and canyons and rock formations that defy gravity. How does a boulder teeter on a slender tower for millions of years? Images of Navajo teens skateboarding and cowboys in trucks. Images of buffalo and sprinting deer and eagles gliding in the sapphire sky. The slideshow was infinite and I realized that had we not logged 5,199 miles in this rented camper van, we wouldn’t have witnessed the vast and ranging beauty that is the West.

The West has held captive my imagination since that first cross-country drive post-college and the four years living in Seattle that followed. The sense of adventure, of newness, that anything is possible. My home turf, New England, was founded by hard working, church-going Puritans, who left a legacy of nose-to-the-grindstone, elite academies, and historical reverence. Even progressive Massachusetts had Blue Laws that once prohibited things like Sunday shopping. The Northeast offers its share of natural beauty — Plum Island at sunset; Cadillac Mountain at sunrise; Mount Washington any time — and a plethora of cultural and intellectual offerings. Hard to find the likes of the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum anywhere but Boston.

But the West. Big sky. Big mountains. Big rivers. Big trees. That sense of discovery. There’s a reason that the West gave birth to Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Apple. And while westerners toil plenty hard, they also play hard. One of my earliest memories of working for newspapers in the Seattle area is the metro editor asking if I wanted to join him and other members of the staff for a Thursday afternoon hike. As in leave the newsroom early? Yes. My jaw dropped; the East Coast editors I knew barely looked up from their desks long past quitting time. Yet off we went to explore a nearby Cascade. During that hike, my first in the Pacific Northwest, I could barely speak, so awed was I by the views of this volcanic mountain range.

Decades later, I remained spellbound. Perhaps it was the time length — 4 weeks — that intensified the awe of the West’s natural beauty. Or perhaps it was the immersion that #vanlife fosters. Because we were camping, each night parking our Dodge Ram in the woods, or on a river bank, or beach, we were not distracted by the interior comforts of a hotel room, or airbnb. When we woke up in Humboldt State Park, the first thing we saw was a giant Redwood. At night at Bass Lake, we made sure that all food scraps and smells were tucked away in the van to discourage Boo Boo the bear from visiting. In Florence, Oregon’s state park, moss-covered rocks served as side tables.

And that was Number One on my list of why I loved #vanlife. We were always outside. Even when we lounged inside, such as after the hike through the Sedona canyon, the door was open to the sound of birds and the swirl of red dust. I have always enjoyed camping, but didn’t relish — who does? — the tent set up, the tent take down, the rain-soaked sleeping bags. This round, all we did was drive up, park, open the door, let the dog out, and start dinner. We weren’t sleeping under the stars, but pretty close.

Number Two: The self-containment. Everything we needed was in the van. Wake up, reach into one overhead compartment for a fleece and the other to turn on the heat, and light the propane stove for coffee. With so little space, there weren’t a lot of options for either clothing or meals, which saved a lot of time. Love those packaged salads — Southwest Mix was the favorite, followed by the Thai blend. Too hot? Switch to sandals and shorts. Cold? Grab the down jacket. Have to pee on the road? Walk to the toilet in the back and wave to the people driving behind you.

Number Three: Every day was a new adventure. We had destinations, but often were sidetracked. The beauty of #vanlife is its nimbleness. Leave Yosemite too late to stay at a Harvest Host farm? No problem. Figure out a stopping point and see what’s available. In our case, the Bass Pro parking lot. Not ideal, but memorable. And we didn’t get The Knock. Security guards did not boot us away. Police didn’t ask us to move on.

Number Four: Dispersed Camping. While I would recommend all the federal campgrounds we visited, found on Recreation.Gov, appreciating the toilet facilities (rarely showers) and generous sites in stunning settings (will never forget the view of the canyons from Saddlehorn Campground at the Colorado National Monument), my favorite stays were off the forest roads or on Bureau of Land Management Land. Self-sufficient, we could sleep and eat and hike and bathe in any remote spot that was accessible and flat. Wishing I knew then what I know now, I would add another app to my collection — the US Forest Service and BLM guide to public lands that allow camping — and seek public land maps for each state. It wasn’t until our second to last day in the van, in Jackson Hole, WY, when a USFS ranger handed me a map of Wyoming’s public lands, identifying each campsite, hiking trail, and amenities. To think of where we might have settled for the night or where we could have hiked if we’d had public land maps for every state we visited.

Number Five: Traveling with my spouse and dog. Quarters were cramped but we navigated. We depended on each other for directions, for driving, for daily adventure ideas. We learned to laugh — usually — at the dirt, the benches-turned-beds, the refrigerator that loved to freeze — everything. We learned that reservations at certified campgrounds are great, but with a little research, we could snag a free spot in the wild. We learned that things will usually work out just fine.

To be sure, we were #vanlifers by choice. We were not the itinerant laborers featured in the book and movie “Nomadland,” men and women, young and seniors, who couldn’t afford housing on their minimum wage salaries. And so they roam from seasonal job to seasonal job, Amazon packaging at Christmas to campground hosting in spring. We were also not digital nomads, professionals working remotely as they meandered through canyons and seaports. On our last night in Wyoming, at a tranquil BLM campground on the Platte River, we met two moms and their 6-year-old twins, who had travelled in their solar-powered Catalina for over a year. One mom worked remotely full-time, finding internet cafes when campsites had no reception. The other mom spent her days with the kids, squeezing in some distance engineering when she could. From Wyoming, they were headed to the Badlands. When would they stop? When it is time, they said, perhaps when it is clear that homeschooling and transient friendships are no longer ideal for the kids.

We were not twenty-somethings seeking an alternative lifestyle, nor thirty-somethings escaping rigid office jobs. We were, instead, members of the privileged middle class who could afford the time and sizable fees to rent a moving home for a month. We were among the thousands who, thwarted by Covid for international travel, opted for #vanlife as an alternative. For us, #vanlife was not so much a way of living, but a way of adventuring.

Shortly after dinner on the Sunday night we spent at the KOA campground in Spokane, WA, we met a Colorado couple, Hal and Marie. Retired, they were on a tour of the Northwest in their 32-foot RV, which they loved but were curious about something smaller. So we showed them Abbey Road and while Marie appreciated that we could fit into a downtown parking spot, she didn’t like the combined shower/toilet. “That wouldn’t work,” she said. Hal was more interested in our first-timer perspective, asking where we stayed, how the dog fared on long driving days. How did it compare to other trips? Other ways to vacation?

“And here’s the $50,000 question,” he said, stroking his chin. ” Would you do it again?”

In a heartbeat.