Hitting the road full-time isn’t reserved exclusively for younger, childless couples, remote-workers or pensioners. Even a family of five – two adults, three kids (and one dog) – can do it, even when their tiny home on wheels is a cramped, newly remodeled former construction van.
This is the story of Keira and Richard, from Carlisle, England – and their three young kids, Piper, Jack and Teddy, and their dog Charlie. Life with three kids can be very hectic, one assumes, which would mean that life with three kids on the road, in such a constricted space, would be even more so. In this particular case, it isn’t true.
Keira and Richard are quite popular in the vanlife online community in the UK, where they post regularly under the Touring With the Kids moniker. They’re not at their first rodeo, either, since they first got into the vanlife experience in 2019, more or less on a dare. It all started with a simple question: What if we sold everything and hit the road?, followed by a rough plan and a concrete call to action.
Back then, they had only two children and Charlie, and they bought a motorhome with the money they got from selling their house. They spent five months on the road, traveling through 10 countries, all the way up to Norway and back down to Gibraltar. “It was undoubtedly one of the best decisions we ever made, opening our eyes to the things that really matter,” they say.
They came back home to England, sold the motorhome and returned to “normal.” They bought their second house, had another child and, for a few months, tried to readjust to the reality of their former life, but the traveling bug had already bitten. When they did decide to have a do-over (sell the house, pack everything up and leave), they realized a motorhome was way out of their budget, even after selling the house. They bought instead a construction van, a Citroen Relay that they decided to modify themselves.
The first iteration of the van was used only occasionally, and is shown in photos in the gallery above. It featured swiveling seats in the front and two more front-facing seats behind them, for the kids, a kitchen on both sides with integrated storage, and a “master” at the rear, with a bunk up top for the kids. The master turns into a dinette, with a homemade Monopoly resin table. The van was used occasionally on trips of varying lengths, and it proved a decent solution for them: cramped but not in an annoying way, Keira tells the Daily Mail.
Trying out the van this way made the two realize it’s good enough to become a permanent home for them, with some upgrades. They’re being finalized as we speak, with the couple deciding for a mid-June start for their big trip, which will see them live on the road for at least the next year. They added a new kitchen and built a shower opposite it, added a heater and new insulation under the wood panels, and are in the process of shifting the beds around a bit as well. More importantly, they’re adding a pop-up tent above for the two older kids, which means they will be cutting off a section of the roof to have it installed.
They still have a lot of work to do on the van and, save for the pop-up installation, they’re doing it themselves, from cleaning and painting, to constructing every piece of furniture. So far, the van is looking promising, and Keira says the kids are thrilled at the prospect to be hitting the road again. The journey will start in the Netherlands, and will include Scandinavia and Finland.
Life on the road, especially with three small children, is not easy, she explains. It takes a lot of planning and budgeting, improvising and adapting, but it also takes the constant realization that this is not a vacation. They won’t be hitting up all the tourist hotspots, or eat ice cream every day and fancy dinners: they will have to do with campsites and the great outdoors, one-pot meals, and “road schooling.”
“We have a rough plan, but we will mainly be deciding our route as we go along,” Keira says. “We hope our way of life teaches them that they don't have to have the standard 9 - 5 way of life. We want them to feel the freedom to be able to do what they want and not feel the pressures of society.”
Keira and Richard are quite popular in the vanlife online community in the UK, where they post regularly under the Touring With the Kids moniker. They’re not at their first rodeo, either, since they first got into the vanlife experience in 2019, more or less on a dare. It all started with a simple question: What if we sold everything and hit the road?, followed by a rough plan and a concrete call to action.
Back then, they had only two children and Charlie, and they bought a motorhome with the money they got from selling their house. They spent five months on the road, traveling through 10 countries, all the way up to Norway and back down to Gibraltar. “It was undoubtedly one of the best decisions we ever made, opening our eyes to the things that really matter,” they say.
The first iteration of the van was used only occasionally, and is shown in photos in the gallery above. It featured swiveling seats in the front and two more front-facing seats behind them, for the kids, a kitchen on both sides with integrated storage, and a “master” at the rear, with a bunk up top for the kids. The master turns into a dinette, with a homemade Monopoly resin table. The van was used occasionally on trips of varying lengths, and it proved a decent solution for them: cramped but not in an annoying way, Keira tells the Daily Mail.
Trying out the van this way made the two realize it’s good enough to become a permanent home for them, with some upgrades. They’re being finalized as we speak, with the couple deciding for a mid-June start for their big trip, which will see them live on the road for at least the next year. They added a new kitchen and built a shower opposite it, added a heater and new insulation under the wood panels, and are in the process of shifting the beds around a bit as well. More importantly, they’re adding a pop-up tent above for the two older kids, which means they will be cutting off a section of the roof to have it installed.
They still have a lot of work to do on the van and, save for the pop-up installation, they’re doing it themselves, from cleaning and painting, to constructing every piece of furniture. So far, the van is looking promising, and Keira says the kids are thrilled at the prospect to be hitting the road again. The journey will start in the Netherlands, and will include Scandinavia and Finland.
“We have a rough plan, but we will mainly be deciding our route as we go along,” Keira says. “We hope our way of life teaches them that they don't have to have the standard 9 - 5 way of life. We want them to feel the freedom to be able to do what they want and not feel the pressures of society.”