Oh the things you think you’ll need and never end up using… and those things it never occurred to you to bring that could have been game changers. You know what they say about hindsight, well here’s ours. (more…)
Trip Budget
Trip Budget
I don’t have a ton of details about where our money went while we were traveling. We didn’t feel like tracking it and keeping that many notes. We just spent it till it was gone and then came home! But we did track the total trip cost as well as the costs for the build out of the van (more on those below). Factoring in gas/diesel will certainly be a big budgeting/planning piece for those looking to drive the Pan Am. We’ve included a link to a gas calculator on our site that gives current pump prices anywhere in the world. A pretty healthy chunk of your trip fund is going into that tank. Keep in mind the effect a more fuel efficient vehicle will have on your fund. Also, diesel is cheaper than regular gasoline just about everywhere in world besides the US. We didn’t know this when we planned our trip.
The budget is tough to nail down in advance. We largely were just going off a very loose, educated guess. Depending on what you drive, what kind of excursions you do, how much you stealth camp, where you eat, etc, etc, your trip fund could differ tens of thousands of dollars in either direction. We certainly weren’t traveling as cheaply as possible but we definitely were careful about how we spent our hard earned cash. (more…)
Reintegration
Has it really been two months since I tossed a proper post with pics up? Wow, my poor, aging, malnourished blog! What have I done to you? Such neglect. To be honest, returning home to the first world, to the United States of America, to a non-transient life has been a pretty insane adjustment from living in a van for 14 months, with no jobs, in third world countries… and it took some time to be able to write about it. (more…)
The Blog is Still Alive!
Nearly 3 years ago in May of 2013 our first blog post went on line. It was just a picture of a Pan American Highway map and a little note about our intent to build a van and drive the entire thing. Since that time we have realized our dream and somehow, along the way, managed to draw the interest of many, many readers. It’s been awesome to watch the blog’s readership grow. If you’re reading this now you’re one of over 100,000 hits and over 15,000 unique visitors! What started as a way to keep our friends and family up to speed has become much more and I’m stoked to tell you that we’re not done yet! (more…)