While overlanding is rapidly growing in notoriety and more families than ever are equipping themselves for overland travel, the number of full-time overlanding families continues to be a small subset.
It took more than three years to launch our global journey, after we set the goal of driving around the world in May 2018. During those years of preparation, I always wanted to learn more about those who had found the bravery to make this move.
But despite my constant search, it’s been difficult to find full-time overlanding families. They’re often more dedicated to adventure than Instagram fame, so many times I can’t even tell from their social media profiles that they’re overlanding full-time.
For my part, I don’t understand why everyone isn’t talking about international overlanders. Forget what’s on the nightly news; forget Hollywood celebrities; these people are the real deal. And talk about upping the ante by taking your children along for the challenge of a lifetime.
For these reasons–the extraordinary nature of these families AND the difficulty of finding many of them–I decided to compile this list. I hope you’ll find inspiration and instruction in what they share, like we have.
One final note on definitions. For the purposes of this list, I’m only including full-time overlanding families, those who live out of their vehicle to travel long-term (more than a year). I’m also focusing on those who overland internationally, crossing multiple borders over the course of their travels.
The first version of this article was originally published January 26, 2020.
1/ Expedition Family Happiness
Meet the family: Inge, Alex, and their 7-year-old twins
Meet the vehicle: 38-year-old Mercedes 613 van named Jacky. Though not a 4×4 vehicle, it’s a great home on wheels that takes the family everywhere, even off-road sometimes.
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? April 2018
What country do you consider home? Originally, they’re from The Netherlands. And they really like to be in Spain, so that feels like home, too. But currently, home is where they are with their campervan!
Places visited: They drove off from The Netherlands and have explored Europe, and a tiny bit of Africa and Asia. Europe is very diverse and made up of a lot of smaller and bigger countries that have their own charms (cultural and natural). So far, they’ve visited Belgium, France, Spain, Andorra, Portugal, Morocco, Italy, Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Serbia, Bosnia Herzogowina, Hungary, Romania, Moldova, Transnistria, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Turkey, and Greece.
Bucket list: The plan is to explore the more eastern and northern part of Europe, a bit of Russia, and the Nordic countries like Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Denmark. After that they want to make their way to southern Europe again via England and Ireland to Spain (ferry). For the years after that they have no plans yet, but plenty of ideas! Shipping to the U.S. or South America sounds great to them, as well as driving eastward to Iran and other Asian countries. And they would love to overland in Africa. There is simply too much to explore!
Follow the adventure: Find them on Instagram at @expeditionfamilyhappiness, Facebook, and expeditionfamilyhappiness.com.
2/ Family Everywhere
Meet the family: Pascal (43), Eefke (38), Nienke (7), Karlijn (6)
Meet the vehicle: Former Mercedes fire truck
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? April 2021
What country do you consider home? The Netherlands
Places visited: Europe and North America, currently in Ecuador in South America
Bucket list: They are traveling from Mexico south to Ushuaia, Argentina, right now. They are making a loop of the Amazon in 2025 and 2026, and then they’ll go to Argentina. They plan to continue as long as everyone is happy with the lifestyle.
Follow the adventure: Find them on YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram.
3/ Mali Mish
Meet the family: Dan, Marlene, Ava (18), Mila (14), and Luka (13)
Meet the vehicle: Ford F350 with a Bowen Customs Flatbed Tray and Four Wheel Camper Grandby Flatbed on top. Upfitted with 876Ah of power, 670 watts of solar, and 40 gallons of water. They also travel in a self-built Sprinter 4×4 170 van, upfitted with 280Ah of power, 400 watts of solar, and 110 liters of water. They plan to keep the van in Europe to make traveling between continents easier.
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? 2008 (with breaks for pregnancies and children)
What country do you consider home? United States
Places visited: As a family, they’ve driven to 53 countries on 5 continents.
Bucket list: They’ll continue to travel as a family as long as everyone is happy and on the same page. So far, so good.
Follow the adventure: Find them on Instagram at @mali.mish, YouTube, and their blog, malimish.com.
4/ Mugjes Opreis
Meet the family: Sebastiaan, Tamara, Maik (8), Moos (8), and Sophie (5)
Meet the vehicle: Class C RV
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? 2022
What country do you consider home? The Netherlands
Places visited: Europe, Canada, United States, Mexico
Bucket list: Central America (they plan to be on the road at least another year)
Follow the adventure: Find them on Instagram.
5/ Oostveen Overland
Meet the family: Esther (41), Elmar (41), Vicky (10), Casper (8)
Meet the vehicle: They started in a Hilux with a roof top tent for the first two years. Then they changed to a 1999 Sprinter Westfalia camper with an Iglhaut 4×4 conversion. Now the family is traveling in a 1987 Mercedes 1120 truck, which is a former Swiss fire truck with a new box on the back.
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? July 2020
What country do you consider home? The Netherlands
Places visited: They began during the height of the COVID pandemic, driving from Holland to Greece. When they became stuck due to closed borders, they shipped their Hilux to Mexico. From Mexico, they drove down to Panama, where they swapped to the Sprinter Westfalia. Next, they shipped the Sprinter to Argentina, then drove from Argentina to Colombia. They changed vehicles again, driving from Holland to Ghana, then back to Europe. Now they’re exploring southern Europe in search of a new home base! They say Italy is likely going to win the contest.
Bucket list: Every country they’ve been to, they’d like to visit again. The more they see, the more they feel there is left to explore.
Follow the adventure: Find them on Instagram.
6/ Slowverlanders
Meet the family: Bronson, Vanessa, Kaden (17), Gypsy (1.5-year-old Shiba Inu)
Meet the vehicle: 2013 Toyota LandCruiser 78 Troop Carrier, pop top, 1HZ diesel, manual transmission, locking differentials, winch, diesel water and air heaters, and about 50 other modifications
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? 2018
What country do you consider home? USA (but they hold residency in Nicaragua and are based in Spain while Kaden prepares for university)
Places visited: From Canada to Ecuador for 6 years, and all around Europe over the past year
Bucket list: All of it. The next big step is driving south across West Africa to South Africa, shipping back to Uruguay, making a complete circling of South America, then going back to East Africa and Asia. They plan to be on the road for another 20-30 years.
Follow the adventure: Find them at slowverlanders.com, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.
7/ The Big Five Family
Meet the family: This family of five is made up of Kasia, Bob, and their three sons Leon (15), Mimi (13), and Tytus (10).
Meet the vehicle: They purchased a Mercedes 917 AF after it retired from voluntary rescue service (THW) in Germany. They gutted the box from shelves and drawers to make space for a tiny, wooden house inside. They have three bunk beds, a kitchen, a shower with a toilet, and a panoramic window. In the back, the table and dinette seating converts into a king size bed. They even have a guest room in a roof tent! Everything is self-contained, so the family can stay in remote locations for two weeks easily.
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? They departed Poland in June 2020.
What country do you consider home? Poland
Places visited: Balkans, Turkey, Georgia, Armenia, entire south of Europe, Morocco, U.S., Mexico, and Canada
Bucket list: Summer 2025, they will be in Alaska, their starting point for the Pan-American Highway to Patagonia. They plan to travel Central and South America for 3-4 years. They say, “It is difficult to forecast our long-term future, but for the moment we don’t look towards a sedentary lifestyle.”
Follow the adventure: Find them on Instagram and Facebook.
8/ The Fire Family
Meet the family: Dana, Javier, Lucas (9), Clara (7)
Meet the vehicle: Toyota Hilux with a camper attached to the truck frame
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? August 2024
What country do you consider home? Dana is Canadian; Javier is Spanish; and their kids were born and raised in France.
Places visited: Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Brazil, Bolivia, and Peru
Bucket list: Equador, Colombia, and Venezuela, and then on to Africa!
Follow the adventure: Find them on Instagram and YouTube.
9/ Tsavo Touring
Meet the family: Andrew, Courtney, and their 7-year-old son
Meet the vehicle: 2020 Jeep Gladiator with various AEV modifications, an Alu-Cab Canopy Camper, and a DIY interior and seat delete
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? 2019
What country do you consider home? United States
Places visited: Nearly every state in the U.S., Mexico, Central America (minus Belize), South America, and Europe
Bucket list: Too many to list, but in the next few years the main ones are Morocco, Georgia, Mauritania, Türkiye, Greece, Spain, Oman, and Saudi Arabia. Barring budget issues, pandemics, health problems, or global conflict, they plan to travel for 5-10 more years.
Follow the adventure: Find them on Instagram.
10/ Hourless Life
Meet the family: Eric + Brittany + Caspian (8) Highland
Meet the vehicle: 2021 Jeep Gladiator with Alu-Cab Canopy Camper (see the full build here)
When did your family begin overlanding full-time? We’ve been traveling full-time by vehicle since February 2014, but we officially became full-time overlanders in February 2021.
What country do you consider home? The United States
Places visited: We’ve spent at least one night in all Lower 48 states; Canada, briefly; several thousand miles through Mexico, including the full Baja Peninsula; every country in mainland Central America; and seven countries in South America, down to Ushuaia.
Bucket list: We are currently driving around the world. Our Jeep should arrive in Africa in January 2026. From there, we’ll overland through southern Africa, Europe, and Asia. After overlanding through Australia, we don’t know what we’ll do next. This global circumnavigation should take 10 to 15 years in total. We’re almost four years in.
Follow the adventure: Our blog, which you’re on right now, is the hub for all our content. We recommend you subscribe on YouTube and follow on Instagram. If you really want to go behind the scenes and be part of our intimate community, then Patreon is the place to be. No matter how you choose to connect, we thank you for being here!
Other Overlanding Families to Follow
There are several other overlanding families we eagerly follow. Some are full-time, some are on a trip with a definite end in sight, some are on hiatus, and others have finished their trip (but have amazing stories and photos to inspire).
We’d love to do profiles on all of these families, as well. So if you see yourself on this list or know someone here, then let’s connect!
- @akela.world
- @camperfamily2020
- @dadaezm
- @debusporai
- @movingmountainsv8
- @nestaautourdumonde
- @ourworldsafari
- @projectwildearth
- @theroadchoseme
- @whereistheworld
- @yolo_family_vans
Thanks to you all for blazing the trail for the full-time overlanding families coming behind you.
-B
First of all, I love the content you have! Thanks for sharing!
My family and I are long time lovers of camping and traveling, and recently started dabbling in off-roading when we bought our Jeep Wrangler earlier this year. So your site has so much great content that we can really relate to.
A few questions for you. Were both your husband and you completely bought into the idea of full time travel? Or did one have to convince the other?
Also, how do you earn your income while full time traveling and overlanding?
Thanks, and I’ll definitely be following your new content! :)
Hi Phil! Thank you for taking the time to leave a comment. You are actually the very first person to do so on our new website!
Congrats on the purchase (and use) of your Wrangler. They are incredibly fun aren’t they?
As far as your questions, let me answer as best as I can:
Q. Were we both bought into the idea of full time travel?
A. Kind of. The idea of traveling fulltime was mine (Eric), but the idea of driving around the world was Brittany’s. There was really no convincing one another of either. Don’t get me wrong, there was plenty of discussion, but no convincing. We are both dreamers, but we’re also the types of people who pursue our dreams relentlessly. Throughout our years of fulltime travel, we’ve mutually discovered what is truly important to us, and what we want to experience with this one wild and precious life we’ve been given.
Q. How do we earn our income while fulltime traveling and overlanding?
A. So it’s been a VERY long road to get to where we are. No pun intended. I served in the US Military for 20 years and retired. So I have a small pension that helps us keep the wheels turning. Then I worked for the King County Sheriffs Office (Seattle) and Texas Department of Public Safety (Austin) before fully “retiring.” In 2011 we started our own company. We intentionally started a company from which we could could earn an income from home. Through a lot of hard work and hustle, we grew it from nothing to modestly successful. After years of building our businesses we decided that what we really wanted to do was drive the world. So, we sold parts of what we had created, hired folks to outsource what we needed and reduced clients in order to be completely free from having to be online at a specific time. It has been about a 10 year intentional journey to get to the point where we’ll be able to drive around the world. Brittany is actually in the process of writing an article that explains all of this in much greater detail as we get asked this question a lot. Suffice it to say that it was a lot of work to get here, but we’re finally on the cusp of making our dream a reality. Hope that makes sense, and happy to answer any follow up questions. Bottom line is that it is possible to live this lifestyle, but you have to want it and pursue it intentionally (just like anything else in life.) Glad you are joining us virtually for the ride of a lifetime. ~ Eric
Excellent reply Eric – thanks for sharing !
Anytime. Thank you for being part of our community. ~ Eric
Forgot hippie.trail these guys are amazing. One child was born in the road
I’ll see if they’d like to be included! Thanks for the recommendation.
Hi guys,
Just stumbled upon your great site, reading up a bit on others ‘road’schooling, seeing if we can find some other families on the road.. As you said, not so easy to find long term family travellers between the thousands of people doing some kind of travelling. Thanks!
Now in Argentina, so if you know of any families in the South of the continent, feel free to shoot us a message @oostveen_overland.
Hope we meet on the road somewhere! We’re heading north over time, so we’re roughly on track :)
Cheers,
Elmar
Hi Elmar! Looks like we are already following you on Instagram. Hope to cross paths as we go south and you go north! One of my next projects is to compile a list of other overland travelers in Latin America, so maybe that will be a helpful resource for you. We don’t know many families in/going to South America, but several in Central America.