Our daily adventure log

 

THE EDGE OF THE CONTINENT IS CALLING
(And We're Driving a Cargo Van to Meet It)

They say if you want to test a relationship, go on a road trip. If you want to test a vehicle, drive it to the Arctic Circle.

In a few months, we will be sitting in the front seats of our GMC Savanah 2500, looking out at a map that spans nearly the entire breadth and height of Canada. Ahead of us lies over 15,000 kilometres of highway, gravel, ferry lanes, and mountain passes. We aren’t driving an overland truck or a million-dollar 4x4 RV. We are driving a heavy-duty, white cargo van—the kind you usually see hauling drywall or hvac supplies the kind Bruce drove for over 27 years —and we are taking it all the way to the Arctic Ocean.

The Great Canadian Crawl

This isn't a race; it's a slow burn across the second-largest country on Earth and it'll take 7 weeks to do. Our route is an ambitious, beautiful zigzag designed to see the very best of Canada's changing landscapes before the trees disappear entirely.

Leaving August, 2026, our Trans-Canada journey kicks off with a tour of Ontario's rugged north, camping where the waves crash against the cliffs at Agawa Bay and chasing the thundering mist at Kekabeka Falls. From there, the horizon opens wide. We will slice through the heart of the Prairies, passing Winnipeg and tracking the endless skies of Saskatchewan. Stopping briefly in Calgary before heading into Glacier National Park.

Then, the real terrain begins.
Mountains, Oceans, and Inside Passages

The Savana will have to earn its keep as we climb into the jagged peaks of the Canadian Rockies, dropping down the other side until we hit the Pacific Ocean at Vancouver Island. But the road literally stops there. To keep moving north, we are boarding a ferry from Port Hardy to Prince Rupert, navigating the legendary, misty waters of the Inside Passage. Once our tires touch land again, we start heading up. First up the remote, glacier-rimmed Cassiar Highway, and finally, onto the crown jewel of northern roads: The Dempster Highway.

Destination: Tuktoyaktuk

The Dempster is 740 kilometres of unpaved, tire-shredding, windshield-cracking wilderness. It crosses the Arctic Circle, traverses the tundra, and ends in the tiny community of Tuktoyaktuk on the shores of the Arctic Ocean.

We have extra spare tires, jerry cans of fuel, a pantry full of canned goods, and a mattress thrown in the back of the Chevy. We don't know if our windshield will survive, how many mosquitoes will invade the van, or what the midnight sun feels like at 2:00 AM.

 

A YEAR BEFORE...THE BUILD

Thirty-Three Years, Two People, and One Tiny Van:

How We Survived Our Toughest Build Yet

Thirty-three years of marriage teaches you a lot about teamwork. You learn how to anticipate each other’s moves, balance each other's strengths, and navigate life's unexpected turns. But nothing—absolutely nothing—tests the vows "for better or for worse" quite like building a camper van from scratch in a cramped driveway.

When Bruce and I decided to convert a Chevy Savana 2500, we had grand visions of open roads and cozy nights. We imagined a beautiful rolling home complete with a bed, running water, a toilet, and custom cupboards. What we didn’t fully realize was that every single one of those features would require blood, sweat, tears, and a full year of hard labor.

From Empty Shell to Rolling Home

We started with a completely blank canvas. A stock Chevy Savana is essentially a giant metal box on wheels. There are no straight lines, no square corners, and absolutely no instructions.

For twelve long months, our lives revolved around that van. If we weren't working on it, we were thinking about it, arguing about it, or watching tutorials trying to figure out how to fix our latest mistake.

Every single milestone felt like a mountain to climb:
Measuring, cutting, and scribing wood to fit the curved walls of a cargo van is enough to test anyone's sanity.  Fitting a bed into a space that also needed to hold our entire lives took months of rearranging and rethinking.There were days when the tools were dropped in frustration. There were weekends where it felt like we took one step forward and three steps back. We bled, we bruised, and we questioned our judgment more than once. Building a van from scratch isn't just a construction project; it is a test of endurance.

The Best Kind of Anniversary Gift

But we stuck with it. Bruce brought his strengths, I brought mine, and together we refused to let the Savana get the best of us. After a year of struggling away, the dust has finally settled. The tools are put away. The paint is dry.

We built this. With our own four hands.

Now, after 33 years of marriage, we are about to embark on our first big trip in our custom-built home on wheels. The road is calling, and we are finally ready to answer.