Winter Alone in My Van in the Scottish Highlands

The darkest days of the year are around the corner and I found myself on the doorstep of Scotland's highest mountains, waking up to snow-capped peaks, mist lingering between the trees and a frosty crunch under my feet. Up here time feels like it's almost standing still and the world is quietly slipping into its seasonal slumber, while I'm hiding away in the comfort of my tiny home, brewing tea, feeding my fire and letting the stillness of winter settle into my routines. I've been starting my mornings here by wrapping up warm, opening all the doors to let any moisture escape and warming up by the wood burner before going on a long walk on the empty trails. If you're new here, I'm Jessica and I live in my tiny camp of Anfrodo with my puppy Heidi, traveling solo and full-time around Europe. Two years ago I got tired of spending my whole life working just to pay the bills. I quit my job, sold almost everything I owned and started living nomadically and guided by the seasons. Join me on this next chapter of my adventures where I reconnect with nature and grow roots in the wild. Hello friends, I hope you've been doing well. It was a very cold night last night, it dropped to about minus five degrees outside the van and five degrees inside the van. I know a lot of you were worried about us getting too cold in the comment section under the last video, but to be honest we've been super cozy. You may have seen that I bought some merino layers, I've been sleeping in them and that's kept me warm and first thing in the morning I kind of just shuffle over to the wood burner, wrapped in my duvet and I start a fire and then kind of get back into bed and Heidi and I cuddle until it gets warm in the van and most of the time it's been around 20 degrees inside the van so we have been nice and warm. Doing winter van life in a cold country definitely comes with a few extra challenges but I feel like I've gotten into a really good routine. I just need to make sure to keep the van warm, to ventilate it properly especially in the mornings to reduce condensation and had a couple of occasions where my water pipes froze. It only happens on very cold nights and when that happens I've got a bottle of water and I just use that in the morning to not stress my water pump but overall it's been a lot easier than expected including the driving in icy conditions so we've been having a great time here. It's just been so magical to wake up to the snow-capped mountains. I honestly feel excited like a child, I just love snow and the trails are completely empty, the park hubs are very quiet especially compared to summer so that's been a really lovely experience. I actually used to live in Scotland and back then I didn't have a driving license or a car available so every other weekend when I had enough money for the train I would come up here to the West Highlands from where I used to live near Glasgow and go on some hikes and those are some of my most treasured memories because it was my first experience kind of being out in nature after growing up in a very nature depleted area and yeah it's just been so nice to have so many more places accessible to explore in my own vehicle and not having to rush or stick to any timetables so yeah we've been really enjoying it a lot more than I thought we would. This week Heidi and I are in the West Highlands and next week we're gonna travel further up north and explore a bit more and hopefully get a bit more snow and for now I think this one is a bit restless and needs a walk so we're gonna go and walk one of my favourite sections of the West Highland Way. A lot of people wonder why I choose to spend some of the winter in Scotland when heading south would be so much more convenient and for me it's pretty simple. I love the peace and quiet that settles over the Highlands in the cold months and I even enjoy the extra challenges because it's a chance to grow into a more resilient person and find a renewed appreciation and gratitude for the little things like warmth and shelter. Modern life makes it incredibly easy for us to avoid inconvenience and discomfort but I think there's something really special about leaning into it every now and then. It adds a sense of adventure and helps me feel more connected to the world around me. In the end it really depends on what you want from travelling and for me a little bit of cold and discomfort makes the whole experience even more rich and exciting. So I'm back in my park up and about to make some lunch. I will cook on my induction hob because gas burns so slowly in this cold weather and it would just take ages and although I've been getting almost no solar I still have enough power to cook on electric and on this note I want to talk about Blue Earty whose electric system I have in my van and who are kindly sponsoring this video. I have the Blue Earty AC200L which is built into my kitchen furniture here and it gives me two kilowatt hours which is enough to power all of my devices including my induction hob, electric oven, phone, laptop, camera gear, and my 4G router. I also installed a Blue Earty alternator charger which charges my battery while I'm driving and the very cool thing about the alternator charger is that it's got an inbuilt system which protects your starter battery so you can use it even on shorter journeys. So this is a lithium-ion phosphate battery which is rated for over 3,000 charge cycles before it drops down to 80% capacity. It has lots of outputs including AC, 12 volt, USB-C, and USB-A and you can also connect it to expansion batteries to increase your capacity. This unit has been perfect for my van and you don't have to do any complicated wiring which saved me a lot of time in the build. You literally just plug it in and you're off. Another great thing is that it's got an inbuilt battery management system which protects it from cold conditions so even when I've been getting minus degrees outside my charge didn't drop at all overnight which is amazing. Blue Earty currently have a Black Friday sale with up to 56% off across all their products and you can get an extra 5% off with my code BlueEartyJessica. Thank you so much again to Blue Earty for sponsoring today's episode and powering my travels and now back to the video. I may look like I'm completely in my element here but the reality is that I used to really dislike winter and part of the reason for going on this trip is that I wanted to challenge myself to appreciate the season more and during my time here I've realized that I needed to stop expecting the things I love about summer to be there all year long and instead recognize that winter has its own things to love. They're just different and once I understood that I was finally able to grasp the joy of the cold air in my lungs, falling asleep to the sound of raindrops and snowflakes dancing in the wind. It's 3 30 which means it's getting dark and it was quite stormy this afternoon actually so I drove to my park up a little bit earlier than planned and I made a fire it's getting cozy and I'm gonna do all of my washing up from the day now because the pipes had all day to thaw now so it's gonna be fine to do all that without stressing the water pump too much and then I'm gonna heat up some ramen which I made last night. I haven't been showing you a lot of cooking recently guys but it's just dark by the time I cook so there's not that much to show and then I'm gonna watch Highlander I think which is quite fitting. Someone mentioned the film in the comments the other day and said that my filming reminds them a bit of that film so now I'm very curious and it's been on my watch list for a while so today is the day. I've been getting a few questions about how I spent my time during the long winter nights. Since the clocks changed I've gotten into a bit of a habit of waking up before sunrise and going to bed early in rhythm with the daylight. Most days I spend almost all my time outside hiking, exploring and wandering around with Heidi and I leave my chores and any laptop work for the late afternoon once the sun has dipped behind the mountains. That way I make the most of every little bit of daylight and the evenings don't feel like they drag on forever. I've been having lots of cozy nights re-watching my favourite films, getting lost in books and even teaching myself to play the guitar. So even though the van is tiny and the nights are long it never really feels boring in here. I'm so happy that I arrived in Scotland when I did because within my first couple of days here the snow and ice made way to rain and although I was a bit sad to see the landscape change back from white to its usual browns and greys there was something magical about that shift too. The river swelled, the waterfalls roared back to life and the whole valley felt like it was moving again, wild, loud and alive. These lands are home to thousands of ancient legends whose remnants are still present if you know where to look. A fearsome dragon called Veighir once nested high in these mountains terrorising the people of nearby villages whose breath was poison and her roars shook the rocks. Many warriors attempted to slay her and failed until at last a humble ferryman named Charles who rode travellers across Loch Leven took it upon himself to end the worm. Charles lured the from her lair and fought her on a narrow ridge sacrificing his own life to strike the fatal blow that sent Veighir tumbling into a loch below. To this day folks say that when storms rage around this area you can hear the dragon's dying screeches on the wind echoing like thunder across the land. The hill I'm climbing today is said to have been a druidic site in ancient times, a place of sun worship or seasonal rites. From its summit at the meeting of the three valleys one can catch the first rays of dawn and the last light of sunset. In Celtic druids long ago are thought to have celebrated Beltane and the summer solstice up here marking the changing of the seasons with bonfires and sacred rituals surrounded by Glencoe's dramatic peaks all around. Hello friends, I have moved deeper into the highlands because the spot where I was at previously was still quite busy with tourists which is not really my vibe so I drove to Glen Airtive and it's so nice and quiet here. It's been so nice. I think it's quiet because the road is very icy so I really put my new tires to the test but I could feel that the road was icy but I didn't slip a single time so really really glad I invested in those and yeah I've just been soaking up the peace and quiet and just having a nice and slow time here to recharge. So yesterday I went to Fort William to get some fuel and groceries and I also treated myself to a gym session with a hot shower and I ran into not one, not two, but three lovely subscribers throughout the day which was just such a lovely surprise and one of them gifted me this candle. If you watching, hello Dave, thank you. It's been really nice to meet people in person so if you ever see me in public feel free to just come and say hi. I am a bit shy but I feel like with people who watch the channel and leave lovely comments every week they feel a little bit less like strangers and I can feel like I can be myself so yeah that's definitely been a highlight of my week. So yeah probably gonna stay here for a couple of days to recharge from all the hiking and activities and then I think once I feel ready I'm gonna drive further north to my next destination. My favourite thing about travelling at a slow pace is the transition from discovering a new place to becoming familiar with it. As I spend more time in this valley I found myself revisiting the same spots, noticing the wildlife around me and watching the sunrise behind the mountains on clear mornings. When you live in a van every day is different. I'm someone who loves routine but also gets restless staying in one place for too long and travelling this way lets me keep all of my little daily habits while still experiencing a new adventure every day. The days began to grow colder again, storms whipped across the peaks and we stayed tucked away between the river and the forest in a little corner of these mountains. And as time passed I fell in love with the glen, its emerald woods and silver river cascading over stones. This place felt so remote and a world apart from the modern age with barely any people passing by and this peace and magical stillness is exactly why winter is just so magical here. I learned that the very name Etiv is believed to mean little fierce one, referring to the spirit of a deity linked to these wild waters that is equal parts ferocity and grace. And the cold waters of Loch Etiv are thought to be home to the Ahushka, the dreaded water horse which appears as a friendly pony wandering near human dwellings and lures curious travellers to approach and climb onto its back. But the moment a rider mounts it gallops with supernatural speed straight into the deepest part of the loch dragging the victim underwater to devour them. Knowing this we made sure to stay away from the ponies and not venture too far into the loch. Thank you so much for watching, if you enjoyed this episode make sure to leave it a thumbs up and subscribe so you don't miss our next adventures. Until then, we hope that life treats you kindly, as always take care, bye.