Lake Garda
Hi everyone, hope you can help my wife and I are planning to take our caravan to Lake Garda next June and I am having trouble trying to work out the best route, we would like to take our time and take maybe a week to get there, Michelin is recommending we go through Switzerland but I find the vignet is expensive to just travel through, anyone who can help would be most useful
Thank you
Moderator Comment - Questions should always be asked in the discussion area so I have moved this post from Stories to Overseas Sites and Touring.
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Whenever we have gone to Lake Garda we have driven down through France to Metz and then onto the German autobahn system heading south to Fussen and then cross Austria via the Fern and Benner Passes which drops you down on the east side of Lake Garda. Some people substitute the part through France by going through Belgium as they don't like paying tolls. However the route through France is quieter in traffic terms. There will be the cost of vignettes in Austria but they are only required for the car, not the caravan. They can be purchased in advance (probably cheaper to buy two 10 day ones rather than a 2 month one?) However they are easily purchased at service station as you approach Austria. There will be an additional toll for using the Brenner Pass, about €12. Tolls on the Italian motorways are cheaper than those in France. There are lots of interesting places to stay en route but perhaps we could come back to those when you have settled on the route you decide to take.
David
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Mikeylynne, If you are taking your time then it all depends which interesting places you want to see on the way - for us on our last trip those places were Luxembourg, Metz, Alsace, Lake Constance, and the SudTirol - so we went that way - using the Resia Pass into Italy rather than the Brenner, but there are no rights and wrongs in either suggestion .
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Thank you both for your advice I will look carefully at the map
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We have been to Lake Garda a number of times and the route we use is - Calais, Belgium, Germany, Austria via the Ferne Pass and into Italy by either the Reicher Passe (attractive drive but slow with limited stopping places) or Brenner. Coming from mid Glamorgan you may find using a crossing other that Dover - Calais more suitable so David Klyne's route might be more suitable, a study of the map will give you the answer. To assist you, we get an afternoon tunnel/crossing and either stay at one of the sites about 30 mins drive from Calais or get to near Chareloi dependent on time; it then takes us 3 days to get to Garda. Like Deleted User User we too are non bookers; HOWEVER, be warned that there is a holiday in Germany 8 weeks after Easter when they all seem to migrate to the Italian lakes and you will find the sites very busy if not full. Easter in 2019 is 21 April add 8 weeks and you have 16 June!
Recommend you join ACSI, in the directory you will be able to confirm the busy periods.0 -
Good point about the German school holidays and Lake Garda. For a lot of Germans a trip to Lake Garda is similar to someone from say Milton Keynes going to the Lake District in distance terms. I would do a check on Google and if your stay coincides these holidays I would be inclined to book if you have a specific site in mind. We don't tend to book in advance but on one occasion we had to wait for a pitch to become vacant and another time we had a pitch which was not really idea.
David
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