Over the years, we've owned many adventure rigs. And we've learned something very important:

There is no such thing as "THE PERFECT VEHICLE."
No matter what you choose, every set-up will have its compromises. Eventually we narrowed in on a rig that, for now, fits our life best.

Here are all the rigs we’ve had over the years:

  • Subaru Outback

    It all started with our Subaru Outback. A tried and true adventuremobile. The gateway drug for many an adventurer. It was the vehicle that took us on our cross-country move, and introduced us to the world of car camping. We roadtripped in this car many times, and took it to places that it had NO business being. But it never let us down.

  • DIY Tiny House Trailer

    When we moved to California, we couldn't fathom paying the crazy Bay-Area rent, so we moved into a camper trailer turned DIY tiny house. It was our first foray into major building projects, and boy, was it a labor of love. We found a great little hobby farm/homestead to park it on and lived in it for over a year. We also bought a used F-150 to pull it with, which became an adventure vehicle in its own right.

  • Connie

    Then, came Connie. A 1990 Ford Econoline E-350, which was converted to 4WD by the previous owner. We completely gutted and rebuilt the interior, and Connie was the first true adventure rig we ever had. She was our getaway vehicle while we lived in CA and escaped to the Sierras every weekend.  While Connie looked the part, she was ALWAYS in the shop being worked on, and left us stranded on numerous occasions. When we moved to Colorado, the elevation of the Rocky Mountains was too much for Connie, so we sadly had to part ways with our beloved beast. 

  • Four Wheel Camper

    After Connie, we knew we wanted to have a vehicle that could handle off roading and snowy trips to the mountains without having so many issues with reliability. We bought a lightly used F-150 and over the course of a few years, we tried out two different Four Wheel Campers. These campers were great, and got us into a lot of rugged spots. They were older slide-in model campers and just had the bare necessities, but they were perfect for short trips!

  • Sprinter Van

    Just seeing a Sprinter Van sparks a wanderlust in most people who enjoy vehicle-based travel. We were definitely bitten by that bug. So early in the pandemic, when our friends were selling their partially built-out van, we jumped at the chance to customize one for our own travels. We loved it! SO MUCH ROOM. Great fuel economy. Super warm and comfortable for winter camping. This Sprinter brought us across the country for our wedding in NH in 2021, and then all the way down the Baja Peninsula and up the Pacific Coast of the US for our honeymoon.

    We really enjoyed this van, but the AWD and long wheel base meant that we were pretty limited in where we could get out to camp. And as true believers that the further out you can get, the better, she just wasn't gonna cut it for heavier use. 

  • Expedition Truck

    We had made the huge decision to go full-time on the road. And we thought that living in a vehicle meant you needed to go BIG- we thought we could get everything we wanted in one rig. We'd build an expedition truck- lots of space for living, great off-road capability, BADASS. After over a year of building out the FUSO from the ground up, we finally moved into it full-time in September of 2023. In just over a year, it took us 30,000 miles all over North America- to Mexico, Canada, and all the way up to the Arctic Circle! We loved the living space and the comfort it provided, but it was A LOT of truck, and we found its size and drivability limiting to us. Not to mention the cost of fuel and parts. We learned a very valuable lesson- bigger is not always better!

    We have a full page about this truck here.

  • Sally Forth

    We have finally come to the conclusion that there is no such thing as the perfect rig. We looked at all the previous builds we'd had, and thought about how we now understood our own travel desires. We decided that 4x4 was not something we'd give up, and that keeping our overall height down was important for the type of roads we tend to drive. But in order to make it comfortable for full-time use, we still wanted a fair bit of room inside. So the flatbed Phoenix Camper was born.

    We've been in this truck since January of 2025, and it's the vehicle that we plan to drive to the end of the Pan American Highway! We feel that it is as close to perfect for our needs as we can get- and so far it's been an incredible adventure-mobile!