18 Vanlife Influencers You Need To Know

Kristin Hanes is the owner of The Wayward Home, a site that is dedicated to helping people live more simply, whether that’s in an RV, campervan, sailboat or tiny home.  Kristin splits her time between a sailboat and in a converted sprinter van.

Noami Grevemberg is a vanlife OG (since 2016), avid outdoorist, digital nomad & dog mom, living on the road in her classic Volkswagen Vanagon. In 2019, she founded the Diversify Vanlife community organization with a mission of increasing representation of BIPOC and other marginalized people in vanlife.

A visionary creator, Noami invokes the power of storytelling as a tool to break down barriers and cultivate intentionally inclusive spaces in road travel and the outdoors. She’s also the host of Nomads at the Intersections podcast and a (soon-to-be) published author.

Katie and Ben have built 3 very different campervans from scratch. And after welcoming their daughter, Juniper, last December, they are about to embark on a vanlife journey as a family of three. Katie and Ben have been running their travel blog, Two Wandering Soles, since 2014.

And in 2021, they launched Van Conversion Academy, an online course with video and written tutorials that walks you through the exact steps to building a campervan. Instead of getting lost in the rabbit holes of Youtube, this hands-on course will help you build your dream conversion faster and with less confusion.

We are Brittany, Joe, Max, and Pickle!

We started our van journey in Seattle in 2019 and have now been traveling full-time for 2.5 years. Since that time we have traveled to 49 states, 47 national parks, and spent six months in Mexico. While we wanted to satisfy our own wanderlust, we also wanted our daughter to experience life firsthand instead of just seeing it in a book or on a screen. We are lovers of hiking, plants, beaches, plant-based foods, and Star Wars

Cherie and Chris have been full time technomads since 2006, traveling by a combination of RVs and boats. Working remotely the entire time, they were fielding so many questions about how they got the internet – that in 2014 they turned running the Mobile Internet Resource Center into their full time job.

Now they and their team help thousands of RVers and boaters understand the challenges of mobile connectivity, select their right setup and keep up to date on this constantly changing technology.

I’m a 27-year-old nomad who has serious addictions to hot sauce, puzzling, and salt and vinegar chips. My passion for the outdoors has grown immensely over the years, making stationary life feel just about impossible.

I find that my quality of life and overall attitude is best when I have fresh air in my lungs and dirt between my toes. I believe that travel and the outdoors are key to a happy life. I am passionate about outdoor exploration, working remotely, and living a lifestyle of work/travel balance.

Sarah Smith and Kevin Long are co-founders of The Dyrt. With over 30 million annual camper visits and 4 million user- generated reviews, photos, and tips for US campgrounds, The Dyrt is the No. 1 app for camping and the largest source of camping information.

The Dyrt’s mission is to expand the camping community and help more people enjoy the outdoors. The Dyrt PRO enables campers to plan road trips, find free camping areas on public lands, use the app offline and more.

Lauren and Steven managed to save enough money to retire from their full-time, middle-class jobs at the age of 29. Their lifestyle tweaks helped them to quickly grow a buffer of cash savings and investments, which gave them the flexibility to do some really fun stuff — like taking six months off to explore Hawaii and another seven months to travel to every National. Park in the US.

Now, they use their blog and social media to help other people do something similar. All of their content is free, and 100% of their affiliate profits go to charity.

Liesbet Collaert’s articles and photos have been published internationally. Born in Belgium, she has been a frugal nomad since 2003 with no plans to settle anytime soon. Her love of travel, adventure, diversity, and animals is reflected in her lifestyle choices of sailing, RVing, and house and pet sitting.

Liesbet calls herself a world citizen and is currently exploring the Americas in a truck camper with her husband and rescue dog. Her travel memoir “Plunge – One Woman’s Pursuit of a Life Less Ordinary” offers an honest, unique, entertaining, and intimate glimpse into her unconventional world. She blogs at www.itsirie.com and www.roamingabout.com.

We’ve been living tiny for the past 4 years. Starting with a 1971 Blue Bird Wanderlodge that we restored. In the spring of 2020, Morgan was diagnosed with cancer. During chemotherapy, we decided a bus was too much for us and that we wanted to go smaller and simpler.

Once in remission, we sold our Wanderlodge and bought a 2015 Ford Transit van to convert. It took us six months to build out our van before we could hit the road. We travel with two pets, our Mini Australian shepherd, Odie, and our cat, Honey.

Nomad Brad has spent his past 4 years living the Vanlife. He has photographed the lush landscape of Washington’s Olympic National Rainforest and camped under Arizona’s breathtaking pastel sunsets. He started out with nothing but a dream of reducing his possessions and finding more freedom.

After letting go of his house, his business, and self-converting his first van, Nomad Brad hit the road. Nomad Brad is now helping others transition into VanLife and avoid the same (sometimes costly) mistakes that he did. His mission is to help other free-thinking, adventurous souls create more freedom while navigating the VanLife experience.

I work at Project Van Life. My role is CEO/CMO. I’m the one who was responsible for growing our social media to the large size that it is today. I did this by focusing on what the community wants.

I spend most of my time studying the problems, pains, and concerns of existing vanlifers and those who are interested in getting into van life. I then figure out how we can create highly valuable content that provides solutions to these problems in the most convenient way possible.

We’re Gabe and Rocio Rivero, and along with our dogs Wilson and Journey, we tour the US in search of beautiful places to document and share as Our Mixed Journey.

Our hope is to inspire others to get out into nature as we travel around in our Thor Sequence 20L, Vinnie. Vinnie is a class B van, but along our 4-year fulltime RV adventure, we’ve also had a couple of 5th wheels as well. We love all things nature and adventure, and we love to share that with the amazing RV community along the road.

Scott was first introduced to Vanlife through Foster Huntingtons’ first book “Home Is Where You Park It,” built his first van in 2015 and spent 5 years full-time on the road with his rescue dog Ellie.

Over the past 2 years, Scott has been working on building his second van while building out his new business The Wanderful which sells camper van soft good accessories and publishes information for other people looking to build a DIY van of their own.

We’re Tenaj & Tino, a married travel couple from New Orleans. 4 years ago we quit our jobs and sold everything to travel the world. We lived in Malaysia for a year and traveled extensively through Southeast Asia with then our 13 yr old son.

After leaving Southeast Asia, we decided to become professional house sitters, so for 3 years now we have been traveling the world house sitting pets, plants and homes. We’ve house sat some amazing homes all over Mexico, Central America and South America!

Brie and her partner Shawn have traveled full-time vanlife for over four years with their 2 dogs. From a 1998 Dodge B2500 and a self-converted 2008 Sprinter van to a 2020 Ford Transit, they have seen and done a lot.

Brie keeps up their website Chasing the Wild Goose, dedicated to helping you with your DIY van build, van life tips, and US travel. After over 4 years on the road, they are taking a well-deserved rest in Durham, NC.

Hi, I’m Hilary! After 7 years in the corporate marketing world, and on the precipice of turning 30, I knew I needed BIG change in my life. I felt unfulfilled and found myself wondering, “is this….it?”.

So after reflecting on my personal goals, I set out on a mission to start van life (without spending all my savings), transition to freelance work, and live with purpose and intention. Two and a half years and one $12K budget van build later, I’m so happy to say I’ve made it happen. Let me share what I’ve learned!

In 2016, John and Jayme sold everything they owned, bought and converted a 2016 Chevy Express into a solar-powered rolling home, left their comfortable suburban life, and hit the road. For over three years they traveled the US full time, from East to West and North to South, helping with van builds and putting out detailed resources for aspiring vanlifers along the way.

From living in a van to living off grid in the middle of nowhere, John and Jayme have done it all, and want to show you how you can do it too.