Skating, Surfing, and Skiing Through Europe

Three best friends rented a van and documented their road trip around Europe into a film project called ‘The Bright Side of the Road.’

Who are you guys and did you meet?

We are Joseph, Tyr, and Timothy.

Joseph is a 20 years old board sports enthusiast, originally from Manchester, England but has always lived in the south of France. He dropped out of school before getting any degrees and decided to go live in Andorra to snowboard and party every day until he eventually ran out of money six months later. Joseph then went on to getting a real job working on board a 100 meter super yacht for two years. As nice as that sounds, being trapped on a boat 24/7 with no days off for 6 months straight soon got tiring, so he left the yachting industry with pockets full of money ready for a new completely different adventure.

Tyr is 21 years old and originally from Iceland but has always lived in the south of France. He came from a large paragliding background with his father being the founder of one of the biggest brands in paragliding (BGD). He soon picked up his dad's passion and was competing in world class competitions such as the world championships by the age of 14, just one year after picking up the sport! Tyr also has a degree in graphic design.

Timothy is 20 years of age from Turin, Italy. He moved to France when he way 7 years old into a French school, not able to speak a word of French. Having dropped out of school at 16 years old, he went on to work various jobs such as delivering supplies to yachts, working as a chef in restaurants, and working on board a catamaran sailing boat. He has always been passionate about motor bikes and cars, which definitely influenced the idea of going on a road trip around Europe!

All three of us know each other from school where we quickly became close friends; I guess being foreigners created something we bonded over, and we all like doing the same sports we were hanging a lot.

How did the idea of this road trip come about? How did you prepare?

The way the trip came to us is pretty funny, actually. It was in 2017 when Timothy just got his drivers license, we were just chilling at Tyr's house and we had already kind of been speaking about going on a road trip and at like 11 o clock at night probably a few beers in, we decided to drive to Morzine ski station, about 9 hour drive where a really close friend lives, and we ended up staying a week which was the best week of our lives! So we decided that we would go on an other road trip that lasted 6 months together as soon as we had enough money.

About two years later, after we had all earned a bit of money we all left our jobs / school, we bought one big Volkswagen crafter between Joseph and Timothy and one Opel Vivaro van for Tyr. In the bigger van that Joe and Tim were sharing we had a 650cc motorbike in the back so it took us about a month to build the vans into little homes and to get all our shit together.

The road trip was all about having fun mostly but also show every one how good it can be to escape the normal 9 to 5 job. We had planned to make little monthly episodes of what we got up to during the trip but we soon realized that it would have taken a lot of filming every day and editing every night, so unfortunately it ended up just being one video. When we look back at it now, we really should have got more organized and treated the filming almost like a job.

Which countries did you go to? What did you do in each country?

We went to Spain where we were mostly long boarding and motor biking because the roads there are like something out of a film! They were so perfect every where we went! We also met a guy and his sister who owned a brand called Owl.&.Oak and was the nicest guy ever. After a brief conversation, talking about what we were doing, he hooked us up with some free clothes!

Then we headed down to Portugal where there was a lot of surfing involved partying and skating. There were waves every day and the skate parks were the best we had ever seen.

We also met loads of people who were traveling in vans and they had been doing it for the past ten years; they didn't really have any money either, they were just like selling things to people like home made soap or little things like that. It was really cool meeting people who you wouldn't ever meet unless you lived in a van.

We were told by some friends to go to a place called Pizza Night Algarve where you pay 10 euros entry and they give you free pizza all night. We were expecting a little village with lots of old people eating pizza, but it turned out to be a crazy rave party at the bottom of a valley in the middle of absolutely nowhere so that was a pretty unexpected night, but it was really fun!

After Portugal, we followed the coast of Spain and then headed up to Morzine ski station in the French Alps. By that time it was new year, we had a really good time partying with of our friends who live up there; the only down side was that we didn't have any heating in the vans and it was so cold that all the water bottles would turn to ice while we were sleeping. We didn't stay to long in the snow because it became unbearable.

After Morzine, we went down to Turin, Italy. This is where it took a turn for the worst: we were skating and Timothy, who hadn't been skating for very long, tried to jump this gap and fell off and broke his arm! So we headed back to the south of France so that he could rest his arm for a bit and be able to stay in a house.

When we go to France, it was very expensive to live Tyr and started to run out of money and unfortunately he couldn't join us for the rest of the trip, so he had to stay home and work as a paraglide tester.

Once Timothys arm was healed, him and Joseph continued the road trip. We went to Slovenia, Italy and Croatia. In Italy and Slovenia we were mostly driving.

Croatia though is the nicest country we have ever been to; it had the most amazing water falls and the most beautiful beaches. It felt like the Caribbean at times. We also met some good people who were locals and got loads of skating done. Croatia is definitely a place that I would love to go back to! We only stayed two weeks because that was when corona virus started in Italy and we didn't want to get stuck there.

What were some highs and lows of the trip? What would you have done differently?

There were many highs and lows. The highs was obviously the amount of fun we had and the things we go to see and do that made it all worth it.

The lows were just things like we didn't have a shower, so we had to go to local swimming pools and pretend we were going for a swim to wash off. There's also the fact that we didn't have a sink so it was a hassle doing the dishes, or we didn't have a heater so it was constantly freezing. Its very different to being in a house where you are always comfortable and clean.

We can't say that there are any plans for another big trip but we will most definitely be doing lots of small trips, and this time we will be making episodes of it.

All in all its been an amazing journey that we are really grateful for and will never forget!! We would definitely recommend it to anyone!