In this story, in partnership with The Guardian, The Enduring Wild author Joshua Jackson takes us inside a community of seasonal nomads who descend on Arizona’s public lands each fall. Tens of thousands of van dwellers migrate to the Sonoran Desert—notably Quartzsite, or “Q-Town”—to wait out the winter. Jackson, whose writing and photography document the untold stories of BLM lands, brings to life the people who call Quartzsite home. His account of VanAid, a gathering where van dwellers offer free labor and share expertise with each other, captures their spirit and lifestyle. What emerges here is a portrait of a community looking for freedom from America’s broken systems—one built on generosity and the open road.
D Rock’s story is one I would hear echoes of again and again during my time in the desert.
In his 20s, he worked in seasonal kitchens and followed music festivals, selling hats and handbags along the circuit. Later came marriage, children, steady work – he “joined the system,” as he puts it. He spent 20 years working in kitchens across New Hampshire. Then Covid shuttered the restaurants. A serious health crisis put him in the hospital for five weeks. Full-time kitchen work became impossible to sustain.
He went back to what he knew from his younger days: movement.
More stories on van life
#Vanlife, the Bohemian Social-Media Movement
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I Lived the #VanLife. It Wasn’t Pretty.
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The End of the Road
“Living in a van represented a new, glamorous ideal, unburdened from homeownership and a steady job — unmoored, even, from the physical world itself. If owning a home was no longer possible, there was endless space on Instagram.”
