What is CanOverland? What does it mean?

CanOverland is the name of our blog! We are excited to be traveling overland and wanted a name that encompassed this. From there we decided  on “can” as a nod to us being Canadian, but also because after researching our trip we realized that overlanding wasn’t this far off goal and anyone “can” overland. You don't need a fancy rig, you just need to start! We hope this blog will inspire others who are considering overland travel to take the leap, they to “can” overland! While that was the initial backstory the name stuck when we confirmed the domain and Instagram handle were also available!

Where are you traveling to?

Our original plan was to travel from Calgary, Canada to Ushuaia, Argentina. We have since adjusted our plan and recently completed Canada to Panama & back! We are now exploring our own backyard in Canada! 

 

Where are you currently? 

We are not on the road at the moment. Currently based in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. If you come through the city feel free to reach out, we'd love to meet other overlanders!

How did you decide to travel the PanAmerican Highway?

We have always been avid travellers and we're constantly looking for our next destination, recent trips included China and the Cook Islands (Brenna is a regularly browser of travel and/or deal sites!). Before our Pan-American adventure we were focused on fitting in one to week week trips in order to stay within our allotted vacation time, but knew at some point in our lives we wanted to take an extended trip with no set timeline and really allow ourselves the flexibility to explore how we wanted. Sometime in Fall 2017 we were discussing the possibility of a road trip, the idea of the road trip came up because we had recently adopted our dog Roo, and a traveling by road seemed dog friendly and Roo loves truck rides! At some point the idea of a road trip became let’s drive the Pan-American highway! With a quick Google we learnt, yes you can take your dog across borders through Central and South American and that it’s not as uncommon as you would think! Once we started researching sites along the Pan-American and the whole route from Canada down to Argentina we really started to get excited about the idea, however it was a few months before we fully committed.

What places are you most looking forward to visiting?

This is a tough one, however one place that really hooked us in was Bolivia. Once we saw photos of  the Salar de Uyuni (Bolivia Salt Flats) we knew we needed to make it to South America! So much so we eliminated right hand drive vehicles from our potential vehicle list as they aren’t allowed in Bolivia (otherwise we quite possibly would be doing this trip in a sweet Mitsubishi Delica!).

 

Update: since we didn't make it to SA on our most recent long term adventure, we'll just leave this here for future inspiration! Boliva we will visit you one day!

How can you afford to travel for an extended period?

We have always prioritized travel and saving for our next “big” trip. This time we were doing things a little bigger (quit your jobs and travel big!) and consequently had to make some larger adjustments. While we have always tried to save a portion of our income, when we decided we were serious about a Pan-American road trip it was really time to crunch numbers and figure out how to stretch dollars a little further. Some examples include, downsizing to one vehicle, eating out less, not buying items you don’t really need etc.. Once you think about having to pay to store all of your belongings it really forces you to think before purchasing! While we are relying largely on savings, we will also be working on the road in our respective fields (Brenna - digital marketing, Mitchell - engineering), the hope is this will cover some of our expenses and allow us a little more flexibility!