Alone by the Sea ｜ Van Life in Big Sur

That's when we got engaged in Yosemite. I don't know. I guess I'll just keep driving. Some days you just gotta have cookies for breakfast and that's okay. This is one of my favorite pull-offs to come to because there's a trail that goes down to this bluff and it's usually like really quiet and peaceful but today it's so windy. I was planning to talk to you guys down there and kind of catch you up on a few things but won't be able to hear me. You can't really hear me in the van because I'm near the road and cars are just whizzing by. I don't know. I guess I'll just keep driving. The sound of cars and people are starting to drive me insane if I'm being really honest and I know I'm one of them so I really shouldn't complain. It's just I really need some wide open space and solitude right now. Like I'm not hanging out with anyone. I'm by myself but I don't feel like I'm by myself at all. Like this does not count as alone time. I really truly have to be like away from the sounds of cities and away from cars and just like alone alone like desolation. I know I'm super weird but anyway we're just gonna keep driving and exploring. Really shouldn't stay. Feeling out of place. Surrounded by all these people. I can't deny it. Today's video is sponsored by Saturnbird because you guys know how much I love my coffee. Each mini Saturnbird cup is filled with instant coffee made from different high quality arabica beans with numbers ranging from small to large and the degree of roasting from light to dark. My favorite flavor is number one always blooming and I also love these super coffees which come in even smaller packaging. Every flavor is made of pure coffee with no other added ingredients. The coffee dissolves instantly with ice water in three seconds and I love that I can make cold brew or mix things up using oat milk almond milk or ice cream. It's been nice to have an ice cold easy prep drink in the middle of the work day and also a great option for those days when I'm just in the middle of nowhere and maybe running low on fresh ground coffee. Also these empty pods stack easily so I can set them aside with other recyclables for the times I come across public recycling bins. Hello it is the next day so yesterday the sun set kind of early because it went behind a fog bank so I lost the light early on and yeah heading back out to Big Sur today. I'm curious to see what the weather will be like because it said there was a fog warning but I would imagine that would have burned off. Besides Costco which I do not have a membership to, this is the cheapest gas in town. Elsewhere it's like five dollars. So I don't know if I ever shared this but I actually used to live here. I lived in Pebble Beach for a year and then I lived in Sand City for two years which is right outside of Monterey. I was living with my boyfriend at the time who was in the military and we were together for five years when we got engaged in Yosemite. That is a whole nother story but in a nutshell it fell apart when he relocated to Egypt and decided he wanted me to go to Egypt as well for two years and then commit to another seven years of living in the Middle East and the East Coast which I just, I couldn't do it career wise. It's obviously very different living in the Middle East than it is living here and I love the mountains. I love my freedom. I love the open road and yeah bottom line it just didn't work out. But I bring it up because being back here it just brings back a lot of memories. I freaking love jalapenos. I eat like one or two of these a day so sometimes more. So graceful. I get like red and kind of splotchy when I eat spicy foods which means I probably have an allergy to them and I probably shouldn't be eating them. This is where I really first started pursuing photography as a career and I was working for other artists in the area, photographers and life coaches and painters just as their assistant like a social media assistant for the most part and I went through a lot out here in terms of building my career and changing my whole life and going through, you know, getting engaged and then going through all of that. But this place really inspired me to pick up my camera more often and especially going out to Yosemite. Whenever I was having a hard time or I was contemplating going back to like a high paying retail job rather than just plugging away at this artistic endeavor I would go out to Big Sur and just kind of watch the waves and watch the sunset and be re-inspired and I'm just really thankful for all the people in my life back then that encouraged me to keep going because, you know, like being back here, sleeping in the back of my SUV, sleeping in the back of my van, you know, having lived here in nice houses it's just I wouldn't trade this life for my old one and that's a good feeling. When I say that I'm not talking about the people that were in my life. I'm talking about the path that I was on. I dreamed of living on the road and traveling full time but back then I was just too scared to make that change. Fast forward four and a half years and my life has completely changed. It isn't always dreamy, that's for sure, but still in a lot of ways I'm living what was once just a dream. Let's go check out the beach. Wanna go check out the beach? This is Finn, back from a week long house sit in West Seattle when the weather in Washington was still perfect. Life was on cruise control, hiking trails were still accessible, the views were beautiful and I was surrounded by some of my favorite people. Then we left for Europe and three weeks went by and just like that the rainy season had arrived. For the first time in a long time I felt the impact of being confined to such a small space. Everything felt so dark, gloomy and sad. I realized in that short amount of time that when I do invest in land it probably won't be in Washington. I just don't think I'm cut out for these winters. I swear it's been raining every single day. I left the day I got back from Europe because my van is solar powered and I need... Here it is, this is everything I own besides what's in my van. So this slackline, I actually love slacklining, I'm not very good at it but I've carried this around with me for three years, I've used it once. When I was here a year ago I told myself that if I didn't use it within the next year I needed to either sell it or put it into storage. So I don't want to sell it, I'm going to hold off so that when I do have a place of my own I can set up this slackline but yeah, it's going into storage today. And then I have this hammock bug net which I've literally never used in three years and a second hammock because I have two and I've only used my hammock once. A hair straightener I haven't used in two years. My mom sent me this massage gun for Christmas which is great but it doesn't really fit in the van. Some extra camera gear, I have these high heels which I'm kind of embarrassed to show. I've carried this with me for two years and I did wear them once to a Hollywood event but otherwise I haven't used them at all. And I'm going to pick a couple of these books to take out that I've already read and replace them with books from my storage unit that I haven't read yet. So here are the two books I just grabbed from storage. The Selected Stories of Anton Chekhov, I'm not sure if I pronounced that right, and Baghdad Express. One more thing that I want to show you guys that I'm putting into storage because it'd be kind of silly to keep it in the van but I'm still really stoked about it and I have you guys to thank for it. I got my 100,000 subscriber plaque which is crazy because when I first started my YouTube channel I did not expect to have this many subscribers especially so soon but yeah it's all thanks to you guys. Thank you so much for supporting my channel. I thought about putting it in the van but I think that'll be a little extra so I'm just kidding. This definitely cannot stay in the van. These are my donations. This is uh this is pre-full stuff that I no longer need so I'm gonna head to Goodwill and then hit the road. Camping area patrolled. Feeling insecure. Better just be sure. Think that I'll take my chances. The central coast is kind of a difficult place to road life mostly because of overnight parking. It's illegal to park overnight on the PCH and I don't have the 4x4 anymore so I can't really head into the Big Sur hills like I used to which I honestly miss so much. I used to stay up there for days in the Xterra. I am really lucky though since I used to live here I have friends that offer up driveways and I know of a few low-key campgrounds but yeah it'll be really good to get back out onto some BLM land and really set up camp. For now though I'm just gonna soak up this place before heading south. So I will see you guys out on that open road.