Tour countdown - three days

After a very tense day watching seven hours of back to back rugby, I definitely needed a break and created a little map showing a rough (very rough!) route of our journey. 

After flying into Vancouver and sorting out our mode of transportation/home on wheels, we will be heading south pretty quickly down the west coast into the south west states, soaking up that beautiful sunshine. Then, back up through middle America and looping into Canada again when the weather is a little bit more to my liking. 

We have both finished work now and officially unemployed. I have to say it doesn't feel real yet - lot's of packing and moving to do beforehand, and then the fun can begin. 

Emma

 

Another good place to start - by Luke

To me, blogging has always seemed to be the reserve of middle-aged people with a high regard of their own opinions. That’s an opinion I used to highly regard until I decided to write part of this blog. Why? So that I can amuse myself by telling stories and flirting with language that expresses my crass real life humour without offending my Grandma who may or may not read this (she witnessed my use of the c-word once and I still cringe to this day).

What am I going to talk about? Stuff I like or hate with limited ground for the in-between such as pottery or basket weaving. I’d love to document the bikes and bikers I come across but taking unsolicited pictures of the Angels is a great way to end up in hospital and hospitals occupy the in-between area I just mentioned.

I’m going to drink beer in some of the best craft beer states of America. I am pretty good at it at the moment but I think there is always room for improvement. I’ll let you know what passes my lips and whether it occupies the like, don’t like or in-between areas of my palate. So devoted will I be to this exercise that I won’t be taking notes whilst consuming – drink-blogging is both dangerous and perilously boring – but I will update post-consumption, working on the assumption that if I am hungover I must have had a good time ergo, good beer.

I reckon we will be out and about a lot given that we will be living in a box on wheels so I shall be posting about our experience of living on the road and the places we visit. The aim is to wing it as much as possible, not because we are irresponsible but because we like the adventure of shit going wrong. Well, I do. My previous trips have been punctuated by disasters such as melted suitcases, trashed luggage, ripped pants, wrong trains and very ugly women – they were all excellent (the adventures, not the women).

I want to take a journey which is the envy of others. I want to wake up in some beautiful places and enjoy the fact that I am not getting up to trundle on my motorbike through the grey drizzle of London to a mediocre job and eat mediocre porridge whilst writing the day’s plans on my mediocre pad of paper with my mediocre pencil.

What do I expect to find? Quiet open spaces, epic landscapes, snow-peaked mountains looming over desert plateaus, endless forests and glass lakes teeming with wildlife. Equally I hope to find sticky dive bars with grungey backing tracks, cheap free-poured booze and lively locals with stories to tell.

Most of all I want to experience life’s ups and downs with the woman I love and the freedom to choose our own timetables, routes, cowboy hats, how we like our eggs and beer, especially beer.

Planning "must-dos" in Oregon.

A good place to start - by Emma

The first blog post is usually a bit sick – a bit like an awkward introduction where one goes in for a kiss on the cheek and the other goes in for a handshake. I’ll forgo the embarrassment and cut to the chase…

Hello! We are Emma & Luke and following our desires to bum around in a van all summer. We’re planning to road trip approximately 8000 miles around the western side of the US and Canada. The one way ticket from London to Vancouver is booked! We will be jetting off on Tuesday 24th March and then there’s no looking back from there.

We have a rough route we’ll be driving and areas we want to experience (more on that to come), but the biggest “what if” at the moment is what vehicle will we use to do it in.

Plan A) Buy a van, rather than rent (renting would have meant tripling our already tight budget = no thanks) and then sell it on again before we go back to the UK.
Plan B) Rent a car, live in cheap motels & buy a tent for all that lovely National Park living.

Thus, we are quitting jobs, saying goodbye to our lovely little flat in North London and saying adios to a comfortable life. We’ve raised the funds through various means. We got married in June and were very, very lucky to be given money that we are basing this trip on. I’ve sold about a half of my wardrobe on eBay, Luke has sold his tools, tax rebates in our favour have come through the post, and we’ve done a couple hard slog ‘poverty months’ e.g forgoing beer, my beloved shade of bottle blond, and not dinning out – my favourite luxury! However, I have to admit, it’s been a very good exercise to know how little one needs to still live a very happy life and not to feel trapped by…“stuff.”

So why are we doing this? For me, it was twofold. Firstly, it was about escaping the monotony of work. Suddenly you’re brain dead come 5pm, and before you know it, you’re watching The One Show and laughing along with Alex Jones. You’re living for the weekends and the five days of the week are forever lost. And this is coming from someone who doesn’t hate their job.

Secondly, it’s an itch I can’t scratch. I have thought about getting away from it daily, and the desire been there for a while, but actually getting the guts to do it has been challenging. I thank Luke for the push who’s made me now into a doer, not a dreamer. This trip is not only a chance to see a new places and meet new people, but a chance to reflect. Maybe we’re having a quarter life crisis? Best quarter life crisis I’ll ever have.