Now that I’m publicly posting and sharing some of my #vanlife adventures (here), I’m getting some great emails in my inbox asking me wonderful questions. Here is a recent one:
Good morning Megan — I hope you’re well. I secretly have a little #vanenvy of you and your van. So, I ’m reaching out to see if you have any tips to share!
I’ve made some progress on my cases, and I’m really close to renting a rig and driving it one-way to (my favorite destination) with (my kiddo) and Ace (my dog). It seems like a 4-day, 3-night trip, give or take 1-day/night. Any tips for me on things like where to stay at night? Should I make reservations in advance or go with the flow, etc.? What are my actual options about where to park at night to sleep?
Here is my short answer: YES DO IT! 100% yes. Go for it! AND. Plan ahead (a little bit)….
As sexy as it seems to “wing it,” winging it has yet to work out for me.
The trips where I’ve looked ahead, made plans to park or stay at a specific location, and even reserved a spot in advance, have hands-down been the best experiences. Those times I was driving and said, “I’ll see how far I get tonight,” or “I’ll go with my gut and stealth camp,” or “I’ll see what looks good when I get there,” just HAVE. NOT. WORKED.
You know what those nights looked like? You don’t - because I haven’t posted them anywhere. Because they’re not pretty. They ended with me parking my van in a hotel parking lot.
Those are NOT the dreamy #VanLife photos you see on IG. Those are the sleepless/awkward nights in the van spent regretting not planning ahead (or at least that’s how I felt).
By way of providing just a little context- I started my #Vanlife adventures back in Mid-December 2020, when the days were super short and the nights very long. It’s hard to consider stopping the drive for the night around 4:30pm, when it’s getting dark, as was the case on one of the nights I ended up camping in a Holiday Inn lot. I wasn’t ready to stop driving to scout a place in the daylight, only to sit in the van for 5 hours before bed. (Now-this was also one of those road trips where I was trying to get somewhere, too- it wasn’t an adventure of exploration, it was one with a destination I was rushing towards). Keep your daylight in mind as you map things out too. You’ll have more flexibility in the summer months when sunset is later. You can also set up camp earlier and enjoy having the van doors open and enjoy the outdoor space outside of the van (versus huddling in a closed van with the heater on during winter).
Lessons I’ve learned:
Trying to wing it or be spontaneous once it’s dark is not ideal for me. That’s because I cannot get a good “gut” sense of a place in the dark enough to know if it’s a good place to park and sleep for the night. Whether you’re a single woman traveling alone or a man traveling with his daughter (as my friend who emailed me above is), you cannot fully “feel” and survey your surroundings in the dark. You could park somewhere unknowingly that, had you seen it in the daylight, would’ve been a “hell no” to you ….
Also, you don’t get the chance to read reviews ahead of time if you’re going to stay at a specific spot or site. I’ve learned those are really good to survey. Sleeping is when we are most vulnerable. For me, peace of mind is how I sleep well in the van. Not feeling good about my spot means I don’t sleep. And that’s a fast way to take the fun out of van life.
Case in point: a few months ago, I made the drive from CO to AZ and en route decided to stop in Holbrook. It was dark, I was tired of driving, and it was a new stopping point that seemed ok to me (versus other towns along that stretch of highway). I’d checked the apps (I explain them below) and didn’t come up with any ideal solutions but some articles and blogs I’ve read about “boondocking” or “stealth camping” had indicated that local parks can often be a great spot to park it for the night. So I found a nice-looking residential park in Holbrook and parked off in a corner away from the street, street lights, and homes…. And I felt good there.
Until cars began to pull in one or two at a time and converge in meet ups in the other park corner … where it was dark… these could have been harmless teenagers out to meet up and have a smoke or a make out session away, or … they could have been partaking in some seriously sketch behavior.
I didn’t know, and I didn’t want to know. The point was they were acting sneaky in my spot and it suddenly did NOT feel safe. Argh. Home is where you park it… until you have to move.
I ended up relocating to one of the city’s newest and brightest-looking hotel parking lots. I parked, put up my window shades, and made dinner before going to bed. To pull off this kind of stealth camping, one does need to be self-contained, i.e., bathroom, water supply, no need to let the dog out and so on… and of course you do this at the risk that a property owner may come out and ask you to relocate at any moment. The brightly-lit parking lots at hotels make me feel safe, and the visiting-nature of the guests staying there makes me think no one is going to notice a van with out of state plates there (versus a quiet neighborhood street). It doesn’t make for great sleep with all the lights and often-late-arriving guests with car doors opening and closing. However it does feel safe.
But it doesn’t feel fun- like, at all … and the voice in my head sounds something like, “why did I buy a van to travel in if I was just going to end up back at a hotel…I could have saved myself the money and hassle, driven my normal car and just booked a hotel room here…”. That’s the inner bully in me that comes out when I don’t do “van life” the way I feel I “should” be doing it. Harumph.
All this to say — after a few times of sleeping in hotel parking lots under bright lights because I wanted to be spontaneous but then my safety and spidey-senses didn’t like anything I was seeing in the dark — I’ve decided spontaneity doesn’t set me up for optimal outcomes (or at least it hasn’t, yet). Now of course this depends on the nature of your trip… are you trying to get from point A to point B quite quickly (as I was) or are you meandering off the major roads and taking the smaller roads, off the beaten path? Are you in a 4x4 capable vehicle where you can park off a Jeep road or out on some dirt road or forest or mountain pass somewhere more desolate away from humans where you don’t really need to worry about being discovered whilst stealth van camping or you won’t be seeing humans, period. (And if that’s the case, then you are perhaps taking other concerns into account, like wildlife, getting stuck in snow or mud, or being offline/off signal/lost)….
For me -for maximum enjoyment - I’ve decided a little planning ahead and forethought makes for the best experience, where I enjoy myself and actually get good rest, and also where I avoid paying a bunch of extra costs and sticking myself right back into the midst of high-human-concentration.
