3 months to travel Europe!
 

Hi everyone!

My partner and I are travelling Europe in May 2016. We have roughly three months (or more depending on how long the money lasts). We are in the middle of planning our route but need some advice on best places to visit etc.

We will be arriving by ferry into Calais so that will be our starting point. I should add that we will be travelling in our camper van so no need for trains or planes. Our route so far roughly looks like this:
France (northern) > Belgium > Netherlands > Germany > Switzerland > Austria > Hungary (maybe) > Czech Republic > Poland > Denmark > Norway.

This is just a rough guide we don't really have any destinations planned for when we're in these countries so any advice is very very welcome! Does anybody have any recommendations for places to visit? We won't be going as south as Italy so it will mainly be northern Europe that we're focusing on. We will be doing a lot of walking, mountain biking etc so we would love to visit some national parks but we also want to see some nice cities, especially historic ones! So we are open to anything really!

We will be mainly staying in campsites so if anyone knows of any good sites then that would be great too! Oh and we live in the UK so no need to visit any where there.

Thanks!

Have a look at www.campercontact.com for camper sites and camp sites.
If you are a member of a club in the UK check if you can get discounts at campsites in Europe. We are members of the Dutch club NKC and get discouts with the club card and the ACSI card we also get from them. Camper key cards also give discounts, and are needed in Scandinavia.

Lots of camper sites have everything you need, toilets, showers, electricity etc for a lot less than campsites.
For Germany you need to be careful of some campsites which are inside the environmental zones. If your camer is young enough you could get a green sticker for it to be on teh safe side. You will also need toll stickers for some of the countries you are visiting.

Make sure you collect coins - €1 and €2 plus 50cent coins, for showers, water etc.

There are also places where you can dump and refill for free - they are listed on the website above.

I would head up to Norway early on in your three months, so maybe do Belgium, Netherlands, Northern Germany, Denmark, ferry to Norway (or bridge to Sweden and then to Norway). If you have a camper that is longer than 6metres Norway is very expensive. ferries and tolls are really high for long campers. Ours is 5m70 so we are OK.

One camper stop, with good facilities, and great for heading north, is in Blijham, Groningen. Lovley owners, good pitches, nice area to cycle around.

Last year we went as far as Penemünde in the east in our camper, and down to Provence, travelling though Alsace Lorraine.

Some sat navs allow you to download camper stops into them as POI, if you have a satnav that is. Otherwise good maps are essential.

DH has made a blog of our travels, and listed the stops we made - it may be of help to you. www.garafiano.nl/travels-with-and-without-timber

You can camp free in many places just by parking on a side street - I have camped extensively in Europe - if you want recommendations of camps in large cities ask - Paris has a neat one in the TCF-Est Joinville-le-Pont camping site - all large cities have nice enough camps on their peripheries with local transit to the city centres great in most cases.

No you can't Pal. It depends on the country, and their individual rules. In many you are not allowed to sleep anywhere near a house for instance.
Plus pulling up in a random car park is asking for problems, especially in France where campers re regularly targeted and robbed. the local yobbos find campers a tempting target too, and the police can come round and move you on.
Besides not every camper is suitable for off grid camping - not all have loos for instance.
There are plenty of designated camper stops, free or for a small fee throughout Europe without needing to wild camp, as well as small campsites which accept campers and charge not a lot out of the high season. We never paid more than €16 for a night, and that was expensive, but included electricity, water, dump and free showers.

Camping for free in France might have been acceptable 10, 15, 20 years ago, but I sure wouldn't try it now. I've seen police haul people off in the middle of the night from fields around here. And side streets? Not a chance.

If you want to camp for free sign up for something like France Passion, where you can stay for free at farms vineyards and the like You are asked to visit their business, and it is polite to buy something but it isn't compulsory.
Many countries have a similar scheme. In Britain you have Britstops.

A lot of villages have designated camper stops for free too. You will find them at the website I link to in my first response. Make use of them and visit the local shops, letting them know you have used the stop, to encourage them being kept open. They don't normally have any facilities though.

Oh and you will need a CEE blue plug for electricity in many places, plus a Europe two pin adapter for occasiona sites which haven't yet gone to CEE. Also a collection of tap connectors are a good idea, since they vary in size, and are sometimes internal thread or whatever. Hozelock do a wide range.

Get an International Camping Carnet which acts as liability insurance in camps and may negate giving over your passport or ID card:
http://www.campingcardinternational....mpsite-search/.

I agree camping sauvage or in cities may now be not a good idea - stupid of me to suggest it though I have done it frequently in the past but I guess things have changed - I no longer camp.

Thank you all for your replies and links/suggestions! Camping for free or next to nothing is something I've been meaning to read up about, so I appreciate your explanation of some of these. Any encounters with the local authorities is something id rather avoid :)!

hetismij2, our camper is just under 6m if I remember correctly so lets hope we avoid the high toll costs! Can I ask why you recommend Norway first? As we were thinking it would be a good idea to head up to Norway in the peak of summer - August kind of time, so will be coolest there.

Thanks again!

It can be very cool in northern Europe anytime of summer - I remember freezing in the Paris camp one August with temps in low 40s at night (tent camping) but I'd head south first to southern France or Italy where in May crowds will be much MUCH less than in mid summer when the temps can also be suffocating - avg hi in Florence in July above 90 F and humid - then move north as the summer progresses.

As for Camping Sauvage or wild camping in France here is the law where it is allowed legally and not:

https://translate.google.com/transla...ac&prev=search

One of the camps with the sweetest views anywhere is at Grindelwald in the Jungfrau Region near Interlaken - you have from your campsite a full view of the marvelous glacier-girdled Jungfrau Massif - I camped there once and there was a thunderstorm (not unusual in the Alps I understand) and the cascade of water off the sheer cliffs was stunning. That said in some key Alpine areas cars are useless so leave the camper in the camp and take trains or gondolas around - may even want to investigate the Jungfrau Bahn Pass if doing some of the expensive jaunts like the train to Europe's highest train station and a perpetual World of Ice and Snow - Murren and the Schilthorn make another great excursion and again not possible by car.

The awesome Jungfrau region:

https://www.google.com/search?q=jung...MQsAQIGw&dpr=1

Gotta say I'm jealous. We had a motorhome in the States for several years and loved it. Always thought camping in Europe would be great! But we never did so I have nothing in that respect to contribute.

I would say this, though. Three months sounds like such a long time. And in many ways it is. But we've planned 3 months there and thought we could do it all. Turned out to be such a short time for all we wanted to do. Please don't over-plan. Allow time for just enjoying.
It will go incredibly fast!

Have a great time. (We'll be there in May as well...for 2 months this time.)

Thank you all for your replies!

PalenQ thank you! The Jungfrau region looks amazing! We will add that to our list!

And thank you Lady! We are really excited! We have thought that the three months will fly by. We will just return when the money runs out so hopefully we can stay for longer than three months if we budget well enough. I hope you have a great time too!

Thanks,
Sophie

Sophie, I don't know how far north you want to go in Norway, but May/June is good for the midnight sun in the north. May 17th is their national day which you may enjoy.

You will need the Camper Key card for all campsites in Scandinavia. If you can't get one before you go you can get one at the first campsite you arrive at in Denmark.

Gas in Norway is different, and you need to be sure you have enough (or an LPG tank you can fill at a petrol station) to get you through your time there. Your normal gas tanks can't be filled or exchanged there.

The ACSI or CCI cards are good in most of the rest of Europe, and can get you a discount at some sites.

If you want to visit Amsterdam there is a good, large, secure camper site, Amsterdam City Camp, on the north side of the city. It doesn't have showers or toilets, but it is secure, and convenient for the free ferry across to Centraal Station and the centre of the city. http://www.amsterdamcitycamp.nl/

From there you could could go over the Afsluitdijk and through Friesland to Groningen, maybe staying at Blijham for a night or two, before heading on to Denmark, via Germany. You can then either get the ferry to Norway or head up over the bridge to Sweden and to Norway from there. Maybe ferry one way and bridge back so you can see some more of Denmark on your way south. Or vice versa if Norway comes later in you trip. It is an expensive country so you need to decide whether to go at the beginning, when you have money, or e prepared to give it a miss if you are running low on funds towards the end of the trip.

Don't overplan, just have a rough idea of a route, and see where you get to. That is the fun of a camper. Three months will fly by, and Europe will still be here next time you come over.

We are probably heading the other way in May - to the UK:).