Our extraordinary journey in blanquita

(First published in Issue 3, August 2021) We are Belu and Lucho. We started traveling and living in a Volkswagen Kombi in 2017. We want to share about our trip, how we changed our style of living, our home, our routines, and everyday activities, and why we chose this life over the ordinary routines (working eight hours in an office, paying rent, for a car, and other expenses, complaining on Mondays and looking forward to Fridays). We also want to tell how we left everything behind to enter a world that was uncomfortable and unknown at the beginning, and how we found freedom: from degrees and professions, roles and formality, structures and mental paradigms, jobs, and the “security” of a monthly paycheck, and last but not least, the concern of “what people around us would say.” It is worth mentioning that we both were born in a town of about seven thousand inhabitants, where anonymity is non-existent, and the way of thinking, dressing, and behaving is very different from that of people in a city. Doing something unusual might bring about tears or applause.

Now, we travel slowly in a Kombi which we call Blanquita, with our house on it, at a snail’s pace in times when immediacy is rewarded, and “everything now” is the slogan of great companies. We move at 60 kilometers an hour, unless a climb or high temperature makes us drive at 15, and then we stop again, anchored on four wheels. Sometimes it's just for the night, other times for a week or two, using the word freedom literally: if we like the place, we stay and make it pleasant, where we enjoy doing the activities we like best; otherwise, we continue traveling to find a better one. Blanquita approves of this slow movement; if not, she lets us know by becoming stubborn, because she really does not like hurrying like a pack of hounds that sees only its prey, its objective but not the way. For us, any day of the week, month, or year, and any hour indicated by the clock is the same. The Gregorian calendar has no meaning for us; we are not euphoric if it is Friday or depressed because it is Sunday; happy if it is summer holiday or nostalgic when the work or school year begins. We eat when we are hungry, sleep when we feel tired, and work at unusual hours. Sometimes we get up at six in the morning and go to bed at eight in the evening; other times, we have breakfast at midday and lunch in the afternoon. We always find a solution: people help us without knowing us and are very kind. Of course, there are exceptions, but there are many more nice people than bad ones in the world. As we told you, we trust and they do too, opening their homes, serving good food, and giving us a shower without us even asking. They are the best part of the journey, and we are certain that we wouldn’t have lasted so long on the road without them. So, there is not a day we do not ask ourselves: "Why do they give us so much?"

The Kombi works properly, spare parts are easy to find, and we can afford them. We are learning about mechanics, and there are more fans of Kombis and old cars than there are fans of Messi in the world. Our health has improved a lot by going slowly. We haven’t taken any medicine for three years. Traveling this way has been a therapy, where the “practice” was a good way to bring a different rhythm to life. A bit slower, but more conscious. We do not get ill (only some minor colds), we eat well and healthily, perhaps we have lost some weight, but we do not starve; we simply do not eat in excess. We do not have a fridge, so there is no chance of having snacks between meals. We exercise, learn to meditate when we run out of gasoline, or the engine fails, or have any other problem on the road, and we shower every day (or almost). We have learned to live with only the essentials, we lack nothing, and we carry on lightly. Imagine a life with less: less stuff, less disorder, less stress, less cleaning or tidying, less worry, less distraction, less dissatisfaction. Now imagine life with more: more time, more freedom, deeper relationships, more growth, more pleasure, more calm, more peace. We have only what we need and everything has its use. We have only two plates, and if somebody comes, we have two compote bowls made from two halves of coconuts. We have two chairs, but the sofa bed can accommodate four people. We have two glasses which we also use as cups, and most importantly for us: the freedom to wake up every morning and choose how to spend the rest of the day, not worrying about a future that is uncertain for everybody, living in the present, making space and time for the important things of the day, discovering who we are, what we like to do, and why we do it, giving a pause to the robots we were becoming in the big city. We do not buy much, so we don’t have souvenirs from every place, no T-shirts saying “I was in….”, no magnet souvenirs for fridges (we don’t have a fridge), and we do not take many presents either. We spend on things we do not need to carry, such as gasoline to cover more kilometers, trying a typical dish, sightseeing, attending a local show; we spend on experiences.

“Thank you for the warm shower”, “thank you for receiving us”, “thank you for this tasty food”, “thank you for letting us park in front of your house,” “thank you for lending the tap”, “thank you for helping with our Kombi”, “thank you for your advice regarding dangerous, nice, or unforgettable places”, “thank you for buying a postcard”, “thank you for trusting us”, “thank you for coming to chat and sharing a mate.”

We can say that there is no one day similar to any other. We have woken up in deserts, in front of the Caribbean Sea, under the Andes mountains, in a dark parking lot underground, on the street, by the side of a road, at 4,800 meters high, in five-star hotels, in a hammock litter, with hail, snow, rain, and sun. It is like having houses in several parts of the world. We are not ashamed to say that we have done more different types of jobs than in all our previous lives: waiter/waitress, kitchen assistant, glass washer, food vendor, gardener, brochure distributor, cleaner, craftsman, learning about everything.

We invite you to read our travel stories and to accompany us on this roller coaster of our travel life on our social media.