Overview

Juergen Barbusca left a demanding job in corporate America for a yearlong journey across the United States and Canada in a van he nicknamed The Shoebox. With a road atlas and a check engine light for company, he set 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, he soon discovered that the real treasures weren't just iconic highways and spontaneous detours but the people he met along the way. Chance encounters, unexpected kindness, and an unflagging curiosity carry him through moments of adventure, introspection, humor, and solitude as he navigates a growing pandemic and an unexpected family crisis. In the end, he carries home lessons only the open road can teach. Barbusca steers his way to 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. He browses one of America's last video rental stores, recounts the night he caught out on a freight train, learns the secret to making Dutch-oven biscuits, and engages with a cross-country walking minister. He also reflects on life's twists inside Ernest Hemingway's favorite haunt and observes the spirit of giving in action-one of America's greatest qualities. Water towers, grain bins, abandoned places, and libraries become unlikely stops. Adventurous, thoughtful, and lighthearted, No Overnight Parking is an unscripted journey inspired by John Steinbeck's Travels with Charley and William Least Heat-Moon's Blue Highways. It blends travelogue, memoir, and the vanlife experience. Full of zigzags and split-second decisions, his storytelling invites readers to rediscover their sense of adventure and reminds us that sometimes the best destinations are the ones we never plan.

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Reviews

""As I back out of my driveway, a surge of empowerment washes over me. I feel myself breaking free from life's constraints, ready to embrace the highway and whatever lies ahead."" --Juergen Barbusca

Author Information

Juergen Barbusca was raised in Las Vegas and holds a bachelor's in German and a master's in public administration from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. He's an award-winning communications practitioner whose career has included roles as a freelancer and corporate translator, nonprofit executive, and communications manager. In earlier years, he also took on a wide range of odd jobs-picking pineapples, washing dishes, sorting packages, hanging placards in subway cars, working as an airline ticket agent and restaurant waiter, selling beer from a hawker's tray, and managing a concession stand at an arena. After fourteen years in the tech world, when long hours slowly squeezed the joy from his work, he traded a computer screen for a camper van. When he's not behind the wheel or chasing down the next story, he enjoys swimming, cycling, foreign languages, and bad coffee at roadside diners.

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