JosephL

Hi all, my partner and I are travelling around Europe for 60 days in a lease car.

A little background on us: we are mid 20's, love walks, adventures and beaches. We are not so much into the nightclub and cafe scene. We are into museums, history and experiencing the local culture.

We are from New Zealand (me) and Australia (her). We are moving to London, and this is our holiday trip before finding work. We are on a tight budget.

Our transport/accommodation: we have a Citroen C3 for 60 days, which is picked up from Paris in approximately 2 weeks time. We have four days in Paris before picking up the car. We will be purchasing camping gear from Decathlon in Paris, and plan to camp our way around Europe. We will occasionally sleep in a backpackers.

We have a rough plan of where we want to go. Because we have the car, we are flexible in terms of when and where we will visit. For big cities we will park in outer areas and catch public transport in.

The rough plan is this:
Paris
Bordeaux
Bilboa
Barcelona
Montpellier
Toulon
Monaco
Florance
Rome
Venice
Zurich
Frankfurt
Luxembourg
Paris (return car - end trip)

As I say, this is a very rough guide - there will no doubt be many stops along the way which are not listed above. To us, it seems realistic in terms of not trying to cover too much ground in one trip. We would like to stay a few days in places we like along the way.

Questions
1) General advice on driving in Europe
2) Advice on finding / selecting campgrounds
3) What are your 'must see' stops in along this route
4) Your opinion of the vague itinerary?

We have a 'rough guide' to Europe to assist us along the way too. However, your time and feedback would be greatly appreciated.
Kind regards, Joseph.

adrienne

My immediate thought is that you're leasing a car but are only going to cities where the car will sit idle and you may have to pay for parking. I would never rent/lease a car with your itinerary; I would take trains (buses).

Why Bordeaux, Toulon, Luxembourg? Why Zurich and not Lucerne? Why Frankfurt and not Munich?

You're on a tight budget. Have you plotted out the route and gotten the gas (petrol) costs and tolls? You can do this on mappy or viamichelin. Have you looked at how many miles of driving you'll do and how little time you'll have in each place? You'll need time to find parking outside the cities and then commute into the cities. You'll miss out on the pleasures of after dinner strolls to see the cities in a different light.

Compare the cost of the car, buying camping equipment, commuting into cities, camp ground, backpackers (whatever that is) against the cost of taking trains/buses and staying in inexpensive hotels/hostels within the cities.

You haven't given yourselves any time to plan this trip since you're leaving in less than 2 weeks.

Russ

Have to agree with Adrienne. Who travels to cities like this to set up camp? A camping trip is fine, but it's not always cheap, and campgrounds can fill up too; you should plan to deal with sleeping in rain, heat and humidity of course, and you will need to have some more rural destinations and specific campgrounds in your plan. It really might be simpler and cheaper to scrap the car and the equipment if indeed these are the cities that interest you, and build a plan around hostels of all types, not just the backpacker variety. There are some deals at Eurolines that may be useful.

http://www.eurolines.fr/en/

Cathinjoetown

If you leased a car, are you locked in?

On the plus side, campgrounds near large cities are often on good bus routes so you will probably be all right getting in and out of city centers, but hope you do have some reservations as well-placed campgrounds fill up in summer.

As the other posters have said, driving in to major cities can be very expensive and smaller places are often worse, we just paid 25€ to park overnight in San Sebastian, near Bilbao.

Some of your cities wouldn't be a top priority for me (Frankfurt, Zurich, Monaco/Monte Carlo) but am sure you have your reasons.

If you can get down to the Côte d'Azur before French schools let out you will have a better chance with campgrounds. Don't limit yourself to Monaco, public transport all along the coast and up into the hill
towns is cheap, particularly buses, giving you more options.

Can't help with specific camp sites, best to get a good, comprehensive guide. Can't compare driving in Europe to where you're from! The French autoroutes are excellent but also expensive. On two-lane roads, the French, imo, tend to tailgate and pass on curves and hills, you just have to keep your wits about you.

I think if I were you, I would focus on France, northern Spain and Italy and drive mostly off the autoroutes, the countryside is beautiful, more car-friendly and offers a mix of low-cost campsites, gites, B&B, etc. Most towns and larger villages provide housing info and bookings at their tourist offices.

thursdaysd

You will find more campers on Lonely Planet's thorntree. But I have to agree, especially now we have couchsurfing, that trains and buses (and even budget flights) are a better way of connecting cities. With a car I would spend my time between the cities rather than in them.

Robert2533

1) General advice on driving in Europe - The main highways are generally in excellent condition . Most of the major highways are toll roads. Radar and speed camera's are quite common. Speeding fines can be expensive. The cost of fuel varies from country to country, but generally you'll be paying around $7 AUD +/gallon diesel (at the current exchange rate), but most compact to mid-side diesel powered cars get decent fuel economy (1100 to 1200 kms between fill ups).

2) Advice on finding / selecting campgrounds - For camp ground information you can check out the following: www.vayacamping.net/ Note that you will have to have reservations in order to stay at most of the more popular camping sites.

3) What are your 'must see' stops in along this route - The must sees are nearly endless if you've never been before.

4) Your opinion of the vague itinerary? - You can use a car to drive from Paris to Bordeaux, then on to Bilbao and over to Barcelona, but based on your other destinations, I have to agree with that you will be better off traveling by train or bus between your other major destinations (Rome-Venice-Florance-Zurich-Frankfurt-Luxembourg). Having a car in any of these major cities can be a headache.

JosephL

Hi all - thanks so much for all of the replies thus far.

The car is already locked in, so no flexibility on that aspect.

The reasoning for the car / camp combo was based on price (we've calculated all costs including petrol, perhaps we've underestimated parking though). The lease car itself is actually very affordable. Also, we've met several people who have done the same and has a fantastic experience. Also, for the flexibility of going at our own pace.

I think the key learnings from the replies above is:
- avoid big cities, pick a couple we really want to see
- book camp grounds ASAP

We're really excited about this trip - thank you for the tips so we can make the most of it.

adrienne

Glad we could help a bit. Enjoy your trip!!