Thinking of a holiday in Europe? Do it your way!
Whether this is your first or fiftieth trip to the continent, my advice is to take NO advice! Why simply do what someone else has done before you? There is no sense of achievement or adventure in that. The ‘Club Together’ forums are crammed
with advice on every possible aspect of caravanning or motorhoming (is there such a word?) but they are frequently contradictory. I have never heeded the ‘advice’ of anyone and, of course, I have made plenty of mistakes but you will too even if you do follow
the advice of others. The best way to learn is from our mistakes, isn’t it?
Around December/January time my wife and I decide where we want to go and the most appropriate days to travel and then, with relish, I get to work on the planning. The priority is to find the best possible site. For this I only ever use
two web sites – ‘CampingFrance.com’ and ‘ukcampsite.co.uk’. Camping France provides basic details of almost every site in France and UKCampsite provides the best independent reviews of sites all over Europe. How do I know this? Well, I have never yet, in many
years of holidaying on the continent, arrived at a site that didn’t live up to it’s billing. The best things about both these web sites are that they are easy to use and don’t carry loads of irritating adverts.
Having chosen the site the next step is getting to France. Tunnel or ferry? Tunnel every time! It is very easy to use, quick to ‘cross’ the channel and delivers drivers straight on to the French autoroutes.
Now for the route itself. This is the bit I particularly enjoy. I have long ago thrown away the sat nav! It is several years ago now but the only time we ever got into a serious tangle on the French roads was by relying on our sat nav.
I then discovered Google Earth! This really wonderful site is a fantastic piece of technology. I simply type in our route from the Channel Tunnel to our site and, after a short delay, the map of the route will be there in front of me and down the left hand
side of the page will be a detailed description of every turn we have to make together with total and individual distances. I click on any one of the directions detailed on the left and immediately the map zooms in to the relevant location. By using ‘street
view’ and a little fiddling about with the mouse, I can bring up a picture of the road junction and relevant road signs. I print this picture and all the other pictures of the various junctions, put them sequentially in a file and we have an absolutely fool
proof set of directions which are great fun to follow. (Note: Germany, for quirky reasons of it’s own,
doesn’t allow ‘street views’ so this procedure is no good for that country)
That’s my way but however you do it make it an interesting project – for me it is half the fun of the holiday!