The van life when you are a nomadic worker

Sebastien Arbogast has been a nomadic worker since he let go of his apartment and sold everything in September 2018. Before becoming a full-time nomad, he had the opportunity to experiment with this lifestyle to see if the reality stuck to the instagram "fiction". And then he wanted to try the van life too. He tells us about his experience.

Like many freelancers of the new generation, Sébastien is a slasher, mainly a developer but also a trainer and coach for entrepreneurs. As he can do everything remotely, he chose to be nomadic. Even if Covid has redistributed the cards and changed the population of nomads, it has been his way of life for 4 years now and this year, he wanted to test a new way of living his nomadism.

" Van life sounded very inspiring, but it was a matter of figuring out if it would be a good fit for me. "he says. So he rented a van for five weeks, with the idea of continuing to work remotely. " I didn't have a specific itinerary, but I knew I wanted to go to Scandinavia and Norway in particular." His only need? A good connection to continue working.

THE COUNTRYSIDE RATHER THAN THE CITY CENTER

With nearly 8500 km covered, he noticed that in a van, he was much more likely to move away from the city than when he travels as a "classic" nomad. Here the city was mainly used for logistics such as shopping, but he chose to find spots with Park4Night that were farther away.

"With the van, I discovered even another facet of countries I had already visited."He insists. Like many van lifers, his main fear remained where to sleep at night in addition to being able to manage the daily logistics: emptying grey water, taking showers, refueling... the less inspiring aspect of the van life.

IN A VAN, BUT NOT ALL YEAR ROUND!

For him, the layout of the van is very important. In the one he had rented, the generic arrangements did not correspond to his constraints and his needs. A lot of seats, showers and toilets not practical for daily use, not enough solar panels... One of the first purchases he made to improve his daily life was... wedges. Yes, we don't necessarily realize it, but being level can be a real difficulty when you spend your life in a van. "I also realized that the amount of personal space I have is important to me. The van is still a little tin can and not very comfortable as a daily living space."

It is quite possible for him to spend between two and four months. Especially since he has found that van travel is ultimately a very solitary type of travel. "You can be really far from everything and everyone."What he did miss, however, was the community spirit and the opportunity to interact with others. This is an aspect he finds especially in coworking or coliving spaces when he is not in a van and ... which is important to him. "This aspect of community and sharing of resources, I also realized it when I traveled on the EVAZION spots. We would do our thing during the day and meet up at night."The rest of his journey was more difficult on that level.

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