In one of their early van life videos, it's stated that after their first trip in the cramped Nissan, they knew they needed a larger vehicle for future travel. Hence the van. It's also stated the reason for doing the "travel vlog" was so they could travel all the time without ever having to have regular jobs. At one point GP said something like without making money with a vlog, they would have to work regular jobs. So initially, they may have told each other they had the same ideas about the trip. And perhaps that was even true.
That said, I've never been sure that it was really GP's "life-long dream" to actually be a van life travel vlogger. I do know (as you say here) it's not necessarily easy to make money vlogging. Many WS posts in much earlier threads suggested the couple's apparent plan didn't seem realistic-- that they should have worked on setting up sponsors before the trip, should even have had sponsors during the outfitting of the van, but the couple seemed to think many sponsors would come to them along the way. (I don't know how it works but some of the early posters here seemed to.)
All that said, I'm really not sure how to interpret the reported Moab difference of opinion. Because their money-making plan seemed unrealistic to me (although as I said I don't get the whole internet influencer stuff and rarely watch those kinds of videos), I do think it's possible BL had realized the way it was going, they weren't going to make enough money vlogging to live a perpetual travel lifestyle. So rather than spend full days during the current trip in cafes that had free WiFi so they could fiddle with video, he wanted to do things like hike as those opportunities would be coming to an end. It's possible, even likely IMO, he said to GP that she wasn't going to make it as a travel vlogger and so they couldn't be permanent nomads/travelers. (Their reported plan to go to the Pacific Northwest and join that farming/"commune" movement suggests a possible temporary end to influencer efforts.) But she disagreed. She may have still thought they could pull it off. She may have thought it was too early to give up. She may have secretly agreed but wasn't willing to back down and to openly agree. She may have thought BL wasn't supporting her efforts. She may have thought lots of things we'll likely never know. Included in things we'll never know IMO is whether GP had a burning passion to vlog (as some have suggested) or whether she'd decided that was a likely means to her desired travel lifestyle (as she seemed to say in the early video.)
JMO
I agree with what Gabby Petito's mother said, that at the time that was what Gabby was doing, the van life. She was young and probably trying to find her way in life. Whether she would have continued with it, I don't know.
She was only on this trip for less than two months if the July 2nd departure date is correct. I think this van life stuff was Gabby Petito's passion at this time in her life. No one knows whether she would have continued with it.
I do not know anything about the van life. I did not even think it was about money at first. I thought they wanted to go on another trip, but this time she wanted to document it further with her fiance. He wanted to save money with the van suggestion instead of taking a Nissan Sentra. But the fact that the first trip went ok, but this one did not says maybe something about this trip was different. Maybe she did want to start this van life blog and actually try to make a living doing this while traveling? Maybe Brian Laundrie wanted her to pay attention to him instead of her blogging work?
I watched an
Inside Edition video about two people living the van life. They said it is stressful and that you have to be willing to forgive quickly when you are living so close to someone else in a small van.
At the Moab traffic/domestic abuse stop, Brian Laundrie suggested one of the reasons for their arguments in the van was that Gabby Petito was very much about cleanliness and he was sort of dirty when he was in the van. We do not know much about Gabby Petito either. Her friend said that it takes a lot to get her that worked up(at the Moab domestic abuse stop). I can understand why the officer described her as sweet. I wondered if she really was that way behind closed doors? Then I watch the van life video and how she seems to be so affectionate with her fiance. She comes off as very genuine so if she is different, it would be a surprise.
There are probably so many things we do not know that would shed a lot of light on their relationship.
One thing that stood out to me was that at the Moab stop, Brian Laundrie said that the reason for their argument was that Gabby Petito needed to calm down outside this Moonflower place. Brian said he told Gabby that what she was doing was getting public.
Yet the witness called 911 to report him slapping her. He made it public. Basically Brian Laundrie twists things around to make a situation seem a certain way. It reminds me of when someone makes a rude remark, the other person gets angered or flustered by it, but the same person who made the rude remark then says the problem is you need to lighten up.
Until you know the whole story about how two people are behind closed doors and how they interact with each other, it is hard to come to conclusions. I did notice something on Gabby Petito's arm though. She had a tatoo. I wondered about what influenced it. The tatoo read:
Let it be.
