No Overnight Parking: A Year of Vanlife, Discovery, and the Open Road

ONE VAN. ONE YEAR. 32,000 MILES. A STORY PRAISED BY KIRKUS REVIEWS AND MIDWEST BOOK REVIEW.

Juergen Barbusca leaves a demanding job in corporate America for a yearlong, 32,000-mile adventure across the United States and Canada in a van he nicknames “The Shoebox.” With a road atlas and a stubborn check engine light for company, he sets out to right-size a growing work-life imbalance by exploring small towns, sweeping landscapes, and the spaces in between, right down to the perils of overnight parking.

A self-described vanlife greenhorn, Juergen soon discovers that the real adventure isn’t just iconic highways or spontaneous detours but the people he meets along the way. Chance encounters, unexpected kindness, and an unflagging curiosity carry him through days filled with exploration and revelation. In the end, he carries home lessons only the open road can teach.

Juergen follows Going-to-the-Sun Road, the Cabot Trail, the Loneliest Road in America, and well beyond. Nights unfold in big-box parking lots, truck stops, neighborhood streets, and wide-open nature. Along the way, he browses one of America’s last video rental stores, learns the secret behind Dutch-oven biscuits, meets a cross-country walking minister, and recounts the night he catches out on a freight train. Whether reflecting on life’s twists inside Sloppy Joe’s Bar, a favorite haunt of Ernest Hemingway, or witnessing everyday acts of generosity, he records the moments that give the journey meaning.

Thoughtful and lighthearted, No Overnight Parking is a modern road trip narrative inspired by John Steinbeck’s Travels with Charley and William Least Heat-Moon’s Blue Highways . A blend of memoir and travelogue, it reminds us that sometimes the best destinations are the ones we never plan.