We are the Avocado Tribe, a family of four made up of Matt, Laura, Frankie (5) and Myles (3). In 2016 just after Myles was born we knew life needed to change as we couldn’t find the balance between mortgages, bills, businesses, work and the life we wanted for our family. Over the next 2 ½ years we minimalized our life; selling our home, selling and giving away our possessions and then raffling off our beloved plant-based café on Phillip Island. We purchased a 2005 Mitsubishi Rosa at an auction site, and Matt with no tradie experience, set about learning from YouTube and friends to work out how to create Laura’s design as sustainably as we could in under 10 weeks. The best tip we got when designing – ‘make sure every space has 3 uses’! We hit the road in April 2019 travelling along the East Coast of Australia to find our feet in Vanlife.

The best part has been simplifying our life. We have a greater understanding for the purpose and meaning behind everything we have and what’s really important to us now. It the simple things that are the greatest gift. Like experiencing every day with our kids and seeing them grow into their own beings. It’s allowed us the freedom to explore and learn about our beautiful country and the indigenous culture. Even simple actions like collecting wood and making a fire make us appreciate this lifestyle. We have loved meeting fellow likeminded travellers, finding new surf spots, skate parks, secluded beaches, rockslides and waterholes. Bus life forces you out in nature, every day and you get to see the abundant beauty around.

We have to laugh when we find ourselves in awe of this lifestyle only to be brought back to reality with a screaming child. There is no escape when emotions need to come out in a small space. Settling into a routine gave some stability for the kids (emotions) and structure for the family. I think our most challenging part as a family has been to find that balance between experiencing everything together and allowing each other space. We all get FOMO! We’ve also found it hard to switch off from the ‘strive for more business mind’ and being comfortable with just being, just being present in what we are doing. Our days mostly revolve around food as we prepare everything from scratch, even our nut milks are made fresh every day (because it tastes so much better and it saves on packaging!). It becomes an adventure sourcing local produce and finding wholefood stores, then working out what to cook and sitting down to enjoy it all together talking about the day or plans for the next.

We are really aware of your footprint travelling. As a family we noticed micro plastics and rubbish at every beach we visited. We started picking it up and decided to set a goal to pick up 10,000 pieces this year. It’s a bitter sweet feeling, showing our kids how to look after the environment yet how we as humans have created this. We have also had to find new ways to minimise and dispose of our waste and place as little as possible into landfill. We keep our glass bottles and cans for the Return & Earn incentive in NSW & QLD, we look up ShareWaste to see where we can drop off our food scraps to compost and take our soft plastics to Redcycle bins at Woolworths. Our setup is completely off grid with a compostable toilet, 130litre fresh water tank and 70litre grey. We have 240v and 12v power coming from 2 x 250 watt solar panels, 2 x 125ah batteries and a 1500w inverter. We hand wash our clothes or find a laundromat, we bathe in the ocean, rivers or a tub and cook on our portable gas stove or woodfire.

As travellers we really have nowhere to be but here, where we are in this moment. We look forward to sharing our journey with you and would love to hear from you if you are on the road or have any questions about bus life. And if you are wondering why the name? we all love eating avocado’s, all day every day.

Follow along The Avocado Tribe’s adventure here;

Produced and published by Jared Melrose Campbell of @youandiandthesky & @vanlifediaires