Love Alaska, maybe not the Roads!
Alaska Adventures = Rough Roads, Wild Landscapes, and Once-in-a-Lifetime Moments Well, we made it to Alaska, and the border crossing back into the USA was smooth, the Border Protection Officer even offered to put a stamp in our passports, something that doesn’t often get done now, in these days of everything being done online! The…
Getting closer to Alaska!
There are two main ways to drive into Alaska, Alaska Highway and Cassiar Highway. Most people go in one way and back another, so taking the Alaska Highway was the start of our Alaskan adventure. Stretching 2,232 kilometres, 1,287 miles, from Dawson Creek, British Columbia, to Delta Junction, Alaska, the Alaska Highway was carved through…
To the Canadian Rockies – will it live up to our expectations?
Sea to Sky and Shifting Scenery The drive as we left Vancouver along the Sea to Sky Road treated us to a smorgasbord of landscapes — towering mountains, serene lakes, rushing rivers, and even a stretch of desert. The heat in that section was intense, only to be replaced by Alpine coolness as we wound our…
Shaun Gets a few Spa Days
— Vancouver & Vancouver Island After over a year of full-time travel in Shaun (our trusty overlander truck/home), it was time to face the music—or rather, the to-do list. Life on the road doesn’t come with a garage, and while Mark is impressively handy (and determined), there’s only so much you can fix in a…
First week back in Canada – did not disappoint
We had a restful couple of days around Waterton Lakes – mainly due to the plentiful rain and chill. It was lovely to see the familiar Canadian red chairs (Adirondack chairs) again as we strolled around the lakeside village and we admired the grand Prince of Wales Lodge, standing proudly with fine views down Waterton…
Last few days in the USA (for now)
We felt a real pang of sadness as we left Yellowstone. It’s such a wild, diverse, and awe-inspiringplace – truly somewhere you could spend weeks exploring and still not see it all. But, as ever, the wheels must keep rolling. With a bad weather front approaching, we were keen to reach Glacier National Park before…
An ode to Yellowstone
We rolled into Yellowstone, hearts all aglow, with binoculars ready and cameras in tow. The bison were waiting–by hundreds, no less–strolling the road like they owned the address. A mama bear waddled with cubs close behind, while we squealed from Shaun. A wolf trotted by with that wilderness flair, and coyotes gave us their side-eyeing…
Wyoming and the Wonder of the West
Our first night in Wyoming was spent in the charming little town of Alpine. We found a gorgeous boondocking spot right on the Snake River—conveniently located next to a brewery. Not only were the views absolutely stunning from our spot, but we could also stroll over to the brewery for a bite to eat and…
Utah, Part 2
Utah is a big state—so one post just doesn’t do it justice. After our time in Canyonlands, we continued our journey along Scenic Highway 12, which skirts the northern edge of Capitol Reef National Park. Even from the road, we could see how busy it was, but it was lovely to glimpse the park’s famous…
Utah: Dusty Boots, Stunning Views, and Shaunaversaries
We’ve taken to calling Utah the dusty, beautiful state. No matter how often we sweep, there’s sand in our shoes, our clothes, our ears—and most definitely all over Shaun. But dust aside, traveling through southern Utah has been nothing short of a joy. It’s a land of towering red rock, deep canyons, and endless skies.…
Utah and adventures ….
The drive from Valley of Fire to Zion National Park was stunning. We followed the Virgin River through a canyon flanked by massive cliffs and multi coloured mountains – each layer telling a story of the Earth’s geological past. Zion NP – We think it might just be the prettiest place we’ve seen so…
Back to the deserts…..
We left San Diego and made our way through the small mountain town of Julian—famous for its apple pies! Naturally, we couldn’t resist and picked one up to enjoy later. Julian reminded us a little of the towns back home, especially as there were daffodils on display in the verges and gardens. A key difference…
San Diego and beyond……
Let’s be upfront – this is possibly our favourite USA city so far. It’s very clean and green. The weather is great and such a lovely temperature. The sun seems to shine all the time, and the light is magical. In an around it environs are lovely places to visit. Our favourite place was La…
Is it possible to see too many whales or dolphins?
After slowly driving down the Baja California peninsula , relaxing at various beach locations, we reached Loreto. A pretty town, and the smartest place we had been since arriving in Mexico; a lot of American ex pats live here. We had decided to do a boat tour as we’d been told you often see dolphins,…
Baja California, Mexico and Grey Whales??
To get to Baja California, Mexico we wanted to have an easy crossing for our first time driving into Mexico, so we picked the small town of Tecate, from a quiet area in California. This was a 500 mile drive from the Grand Canyon, which for us tortoises meant a few days. We split the…
Observations from our time in the USA
It really does feel different to the UK and Europe. We have spent 6 months in the USA so far and are looking forward to seeing more of it. Even though we, as British, have a lot in common culturally, we have found some big differences:-
Big scenery, but does it live up to expectations?….
So, after lots of ancient history in New Mexico it was time to go and see some epic scenery, as seen in many, many movies! It was an interesting drive to Monument Valley, through the Navajo tribal lands and quite different to what we’ve seen already in the USA. The way that people live seems…
We went to the dark side in Albuquerque (Breaking Bad land)
So, we reached Albuquerque, New Mexico. Not really a place that we had on our list to visit even though Better Call Saul and Breaking Bad was filmed here, programmes we really enjoyed watching. We came here to do some functional things and to look at new bikes. We have decided to go to the…
Shaun has got a girlfriend in New Mexico😉🥰
We were really excited to be meeting up with fellow travellers from the UK. Dolly’s Diary, aka Dan and Geraldine have been travelling with their Unimog in the USA and Mexico and as they were travelling east and we were travelling west, Mark and Dan made a plan for us to meet. Dan found a great…
Feel the fear and do it anyway!
So, we are still in Texas! This time in a National Park, albeit a small one. They have a small campground, well a car park really, for about 20 RV’s or caravans. Facilities are…….. a toilet. It is also a trailhead for several walks, and we liked that, being able to walk from the door.…
Tale of two towns in Texas
Terlingua and Marfa West Texas has quite a few ghost towns, towns that boomed for a while and when they lost their reason for being, usually mining, they died. We have seen a few on our travels, but spent a bit more time in two, Terlingua and Marfa. Both have been revitalised, attract tourists but…
West Texas, big dark skies
West Texas delivers. Big dark skies! Space! Very few shops and no shopping malls. Traffic getting less and less! We left built up San Antonio and headed off to the hills, we’ll sort of! We headed off and as we drove the shopping strips and malls started to decrease, and towns got smaller and smaller.…
Texas, the Lone Star State
Almost immediately the scenery changed – rice fields and cattle and industry, but overwhelmingly the main thing was – Industry! Many miles of chemical plants belching out smoke greeted us. Freight trains with miles of liquid tank and barges carrying goodness knows what! After a very rural, agricultural Louisianna it was quite a change! First stop…
Louisiana
New Orleans, shall we, shan’t we? Our heartfelt sympathies go out to the people of New Orleans over the terrible event of 1/1. We had planned to visit New Orleans for the first Mardi Gras parades on 6/1 and had to have a serious think about that. We decided we would go and support the…
Florida, the furthest south so far?!
We entered our 14th state, pleased to be getting to warmer weather! We were also pleased that we were still in a landscape of live oak trees and Spanish moss. The campground at the National Park of Fort Clinch was a veritable forest of these trees along with palm trees. We had a nice explore around…
Going south!
After leaving Washington, we headed towards Norfolk, Virginia. This was partly because we had a Shaun related task, meeting up with an engineer who serviced our generator. This gave us an opportunity to use a Harvest Host we had heard about that we wanted to visit, Keystone Tractor Museum. Mark loves all things farming related, and in…
Washington DC for Thanksgiving, history and memorials!
We gradually made up way back north slightly to visit Washington DC. Having looked at places to stay with Shaun, we couldn’t find any Harvest Hosts or campgrounds close enough to make travelling in easy. We decided to do another house sit, and found one in Arlington, which gave us easy access to downtown Washington.…
New Jersey shore line, going south! Now getting gorgeous autumn colours
After leaving The Big Apple, we thought we would have a couple of chill out days by the ocean. We went to Cape May, a very nice town full of gorgeous houses and a nice ocean front. As it was almost Halloween, we saw so many houses with great decorations. This was also the first…
New York, New York
First off, what an experience, driving into New York! We have a Garmin device that knows our height, and it sent us on a convoluted route into Brooklyn where our RV park up site was. In the end this was interesting, we were sightseeing from Shaun through some diverse neighbourhoods! We decided to stay on…
Shaun ………. More problems, is life on the road worth it?
Mark realised we had a mechanical issue , as we continually had a coolant leak. This often meant an alarm went off as were driving, and we would have to stop and put more coolant in the expansion tank. With help from Willie at MBNI, Mark diagnosed we had a problem with the compressor so…
Travelling fast to get to the Overland Expo!!
Travelling in Shaun is a great conversation starter, for example the Ackermans from Vermont. We decided early on if we were offered opportunities through these conversations we would try and follow up on them. One such conversation led us to consider attending an Overland Expo in Arrington, Virginia. We were in the parking lot of…
Next stop is the border crossing into USA, will they let us in??
USA, here we come!! We were a little nervous on approaching the border crossing, which was very quiet. Although we had a B2 visa granted to us back in 2023, which on paper gives us 6 months in USA at any one time, over a 10 year, period, we had read that the length of…
Is there life after Newfoundland??
After we reluctantly left Newfoundland we went to stay with our kind and long suffering relatives, Jim and Anne, near Halifax (they have put us up a lot more than any of us expected!). We had a lovely evening with them before they headed off to see their new grandchild on Prince Edward Island. We…
Finally travelling in Shaun in Canada, but do we want to carry on?
So, we finally set off in Shaun on 31 July! Not too far at first as we needed to get our confidence in Shaun back. So, first stop, Murphy’s Cove, on a camp site, by the ocean, just 50 miles up the road. Then on to Sherbrooke, Nova Scotia, a riverside campground, and a chance…
July 2024 Picking up Shaun, or did we?
We arrived in Canada, Toronto, on 26 June, and spent a couple of nights in Niagara Falls, so awesome. We then flew to Halifax, to pick up Shaun but also to spend a few days with Jim, Mark’s uncle, and his wife Anne near Dartmouth, Halifax. As expected, the ship carrying Shaun arrived in Halifax,…
June 2024
The first thing we did in June was to attend the Vanlife Festival in Shrewsbury. This was really interesting, and had one great benefit, meeting other overlanders and making new, like-minded friends. We are looking forward to watching their travels; who knows if our paths will cross in the future, but we hope so. As…
Finally!!
So, we finally got Shaun! A surprisingly long wait, but well worth it. We had sold our last motorhome, a very comfortable Burstner Aviano i728g, expecting Shaun to be ready a lot sooner than it was (over a year late!). We filled our time exploring through doing house / pet sits throughout the UK. This…
Happiest when exploring 