First of all, my name’s Jon (I promise I’ll stay behind the camera as much as possible from now on).

I’m married to Lisa (who refuses to drive Gunther – evidently I neglected to mention that he was left-hand drive).

This is our daughter. She’s Annabel, and is our little adventurer.

And this is bump (human hopefully, but type TBC). ETA May.

Which is kind of what this year will be about. We’re planning a maternity/paternity/shared parental leave trip to last as long as our savings will last. We’re doing sums, we’re looking down the back of the sofa to see what we can muster to make it last as long as possible, to make it a trip that we’ll all cherish (well, three of us at least), all before Annabel starts school in September.

Why?

While thinking about putting together an adventure across Europe, and looking to do some research, there’s a dearth of info out there written down online, or on YouTube, or on the shelves of Stamfords about travelling with children (let alone very little ones) in a van, even less in one that’s 30 years old. Nothing. The best I managed to read was The Long and Whining Road by Simeon Courtie – about a family trip around the world in a VW T3 busking Beatles songs along the way (reluctantly). But, and it’s quite a big but – not that many of us will ever pack everything up to take a van around the world. And cramming a round the world trip into a few hundred pages of travel writing means it was sometimes light on the detail of travel, about life in the van itself.

So, my intention for this series of blogs, photos, and videos will be about the travelling, about the how and where, but also about some of the other details of life on the road. And life on the road with a newborn.