Van-wedding fairy tale

(First published in Issue 2, October 2020) That is how we would answer the question about our perfect gift… in fact, our perfect wedding gift.

Hi, we are Lea and Philip, two open-minded souls, a vanlife couple, and travelers at heart. – And this is our van-wedding story.

We met many years ago when we were both still in school and started our life journey together. Our journey as travelers, however, began with a classic: A South East Asia backpacking trip with some work and travel jobs. That we would leave our nine-to-five jobs some years later, give up our small flat in the Thuringian Forest in Germany, and start traveling the world was far from clear at that time.

In the following years, things changed. We evolved and became clear about the life we wanted to create: Every time we came home from a trip, we consistently felt like we had seen many places, but failed to get a real understanding of them. We wanted to explore the world – not for a three-week holiday a year, but we aimed to create a life of travel. We started dreaming about moving freely from place to place in our own pace, immersing ourselves in local cultures and getting a deeper understanding of the places we visit, and we aimed at spending most of our time outdoors. We dreamt about soaking up nature far removed from traffic noises, meeting with the silence of the forest, slowing down, and enjoying the simple life. We dreamt about being at home everywhere in the world.

So, we decided to buy an old caravan and started travelling Europe. What we didn't realize was that the caravan would become a kind of prototype for our van conversion of a 1987 Mercedes 310 fire truck in 2018: But when we started to plan our journey to Central Asia, we soon came to realize that the caravan does not suit this way of traveling and exploring. What we needed was a more robust car for some off-road adventures in the Caucasus, Altai mountains and the Gobi Desert. Our van, the.redcamper, has been a real heart project over the last two years – and still is! Not only did we build a place to sleep, chill, work and cook, but we built a home for us.

Philip's marriage proposal was somewhat the cherry on the cake! Since we always shared a passion for being in nature and had created this cozy home on wheels, when we started wedding planning, we loved the idea of getting married in the forest.

Easier said than done. But it happened that – on a Sunday evening run - we stumbled across a hut located under some gnarled old trees in the middle of the forest. By pure coincidence, we found the perfect place for us and our van wedding in the woods.

After six months of planning, organizing ourselves, our family, and friends, collecting and refurbishing chairs, building tables, creating natural decorations, and tasting cakes, the wedding day finally arrived. For our wedding theme, we chose "at home outdoors," and the decorations followed a natural bohemian style. Our van was decorated with handmade macramé, hundreds of candles, large natural stones, wooden boxes, oriental carpets, dried flowers, white wool blankets, and feather pillows.

We had a perfect day with our family and friends and celebrated our wedding until late night dancing under the stars. It was a full moon night when we retired to our camper. That night, we surely dreamt of a lifetime filled with adventures.